


Blue Moon

by half_rice



Category: ITZY (Band), Stray Kids (Band), TOMORROW X TOGETHER | TXT (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Space, F/F, F/M, Heavy Angst, M/M, One-sided Enemies to Lovers, Sexual Content, Slow Burn, THE CHAERYEONGxJEONGIN IS ABSOLUTE CRACK I KNOW, outer space but no science only gay
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:07:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 31
Words: 129,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23358268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/half_rice/pseuds/half_rice
Summary: Yeonjun is a formerly ambitious space captain who has only one goal left: To beat Soobin.Life gets in the way.• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •A space explorer au that features txt, itzy, skz, and other rOoKiE legends.
Relationships: Choi Beomgyu/Choi Soobin, Choi Beomgyu/Choi Yeonjun, Choi Soobin/Choi Yeonjun, lee chaeryeong/yang jeongin
Comments: 241
Kudos: 421





	1. Flying First Class

**Author's Note:**

> ~Extras~
> 
> ⭐ [Twitter thread on what the Fleet uniforms look like 👀](https://twitter.com/halp_rice/status/1352908738470928385)
> 
> ⭐ [Spotify Playlist that follows the entire plot if you listen in order...](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6fRaE1Vh8yZsd3LUNhTWj3&si=863c181544c94bf3)

The view outside Yeonjun’s window is dark. It’s all black and _blank_ , like everything that had been it had been rubbed out.

Yeonjun looks around, frowning. _That’s not right. That’s not what it looks like. Where are all the stars?_

His ears start ringing, so loudly that it sends a jolt of pain right through his skull. He doubles over in pain, covering both his ears, but it does nothing – the sound seems to be coming from inside his head.

Yeonjun unclips his seatbelt. It’s only then that he realizes he’s in the captain’s chair of a first-class ship. It’s what he’s always wanted. _Isn’t it?_

The lights all around the bridge flicker, even the emergency strip lights along the floor.

“Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun tries to turn to the source of the voice. He can’t recognize it until they shout again.

“Yeonjun, let’s go!”

Yeonjun frowns at the other boy holding out a hand to him. _Kim Soobin? What the-_

“ _Hurry_!” Soobin shouts, grabbing Yeonjun by the arm.

The lights blink out, drowning them in the deep emptiness from the window outside.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun jolts awake, feeling like he had just fallen into his bed. He wonders if the Academy’s gravity had glitched out again. _It won’t be the first time._

He lies there for a few minutes, hearing the ambient sounds of bird chirping just outside the window. A rooster crows in the distance, just as the light filtering in through the blinds warms up to a pale orange.

Yeonjun sits up and switches the window’s display off. The tree just outside the window fades away, followed by the other houses in the neighborhood, until finally, the sky darkens to black dotted with little pinpricks of light.

Yeonjun heaves a sigh of relief, smiling at the view. That’s what he likes about living on the Moon: being able to see the stars. He doesn’t know why anyone would rather see the fake blue sky and white clouds of a window screensaver.

“Turn it back on please,” His roommate says, though he’s facedown on his pillow.

“Sorry, Chan.” Yeonjun says, flicking the window back on. Their dorm room is flooded with the warm orange light of a sunrise that only exists in the window’s screen.

Chan mumbles his thanks before rolling over to fall back asleep.

Yeonjun gets up and straightens out his sheets. There’s no inspection today, but he flattens out every last crease anyway. It soothes him.

The pool is empty when Yeonjun arrives. Actually, the entire university gym complex, which is usually full of students training, is empty. He knows that it’s because most of his classmates, Chan included, had spent the night before getting wasted at a party thrown by the student council for the graduating class. He knows that he, being a member of the graduating class, could’ve been there.

Yeonjun snorts. He’s never been to a party in his four years at the Academy, and he’s not about to break that streak now.

He’s on his twelfth lap when everything goes dark.

_No._

_This can’t be happening._

_That was just a dream._

The water around him grows so cold it makes his limbs feel numb, and it’s so dark he can hardly tell up from down as he flails around, trying to get up for air.

He lets out a loud gasp when he breaks the surface, arms thrashing about as he tries to find a lane divider to hang onto.

“HOLY SHIT!”

The ceiling’s screen lights up again with a fake blue sky and smattering of grayish-white clouds. Yeonjun realizes he’s hanging onto a lane divider like a little kid, and lets go before anyone sees. He treads the water, trying to look calm he can while the person who’d shut the lights off runs over.

“I’m so sorry, Yeonjun, I didn’t think there was anyone in here!”

“It’s okay, Instructor Jung.” Yeonjun says, doing a few lazy kicks to bring him to the side of the pool. “I was just about to get out.”

“You shouldn’t be swimming if you’re hungover.” The instructor says, frowning at Yeonjun.

“I’m not hungover.” Yeonjun grunts out as he pulls himself out of the water. “I didn’t go last night.”

“Why not?” The instructor reaches for Yeonjun’s towel on a nearby bench and tosses it over. “You deserve it. We rarely have anyone come first in _every_ exam.”

“There are other ways to celebrate without getting piss-drunk.” Yeonjun says, shaking his hair out.

“So what fun alternative did you do last night?”

Yeonjun’s face colors as he says, “Nothing.”

“Wow.” Instructor Jung gives him two thumbs up and a dry smile. “So much fun.”

“I just don’t like the others that much, okay?” Yeonjun says, reaching for his bottle of water. “Being stuck with them during class is bad enough.”

“You know that you’re about to be stuck with four other people in a tiny ship for the next two months, right?”

Yeonjun shudders. “How can I forget?”

“Jeez,” Instructor Jung says with a small chuckle. “Good luck to your crewmates.”

Yeonjun scowls at the instructor. “Won’t I need it more than them?”

The instructor just shrugs.

Monday mornings on the Moon are the beginning of the week. The sun rises, a bright and distant ball that climbs up for the horizon but does little in the way of warmth.

The graduating class shivers under the clear dome of the Academy’s amphitheater.

“Is someone sitting here?”

Yeonjun looks up, then at the empty seat next to him. “No.”

“Can I?”

“There aren’t any assignments, Chaeryeong.” Yeonjun says. _You should know that_ , he adds mentally, but he feels obliged to be kind to Chaeryeong. He has more in common with her than anyone else here, and she’s never actually given him a reason to dislike him. That puts her pretty high on his list of Least Hated Classmates.

Chaeryeong settles into the seat, ironing out the folds in her skirt with her hands. “Are you excited? I’m excited.”

Yeonjun decides that the best reply to that is, “Yeah.”

“Do you think we’ll be assigned together-” Chaeryeong laughs. “No, there’s no way we’re the same rank, I totally fucked up my exams last week.”

Yeonjun doesn’t know what he’s supposed to say to that. _“That’s too bad” doesn’t sound quite right._

The buzz of the amphitheater’s audio system saves him.

“Uh, could we all please settle down?” One of the professors croaks into the mic. “The Director will be arriving shortly.”

There’s a lull in the noise, like the graduating class consider it for a second. Then they go right back to catching up with each other as if the professor currently quaking on the stage is invisible.

“Everybody, quiet.”

The Director is a small man, so much so that Yeonjun can barely see him from where he’s sitting, but the entire amphitheater falls silent when he speaks.

“Thank you.” The Director says. “I have to announce a thousand names this morning, so please keep it down unless you want to be here all day.”

Someone to the left of the amphitheater sneezes, and the students are so silent that it echoes.

“Bless you.” The Director clips a pair of glasses over his eyes as he lifts his tablet to read. “We’ll be starting with the first rank group.”

Yeonjun leans back in his chair, trying to look calm and unassuming. But some people are already looking his way, and it’s making Yeonjun’s ears heat up.

“We’ll start with the first rank of the Captain program,” the Director says, clearing his throat.

Chaeryeong nudges him with his elbow. “That’s you, right?” She whispers excitedly.

Yeonjun gives her a humble shrug in reply. His heart is racing.

“The Captain of the Rank 1 crew is Kim Soobin.”

Yeonjun’s heart stutters to a stop. _Excuse me?_

_What kind of fuckassery is this?_

The crowd lets out a confused, unanimous, “Huh?”

“His first mate and pilot is Hwang Yeji, and their medical officer is Jung Kai…” the Director carries on, unbothered by the whispers making their way through the crowd in waves.

Yeonjun feels like he’s just been slapped. He’s never actually been slapped, because no way would he let anyone get _that_ close to him, but he figures this is what it feels like.

“Maybe they made a mistake,” Chaeryeong whispers quietly.

“ _Maybe_?” Yeonjun scoffs, already pulling up his transcript on his phone. His grades are flawless. He came out first in every exam, both written and practical, by at least 10% of the total score. _There’s no way Kim fucking Soobin is ranked first in our program-_

“The Captain of the Rank 2 crew is Bang Chan.”

Yeonjun nearly throws his phone. _I’m not even second?_ This is the dumbest thing he’s ever heard, and he’s once had to listen to a drunk classmate cry about her ex-girlfriend.

“This is bullshit.” Yeonjun says, standing up.

“What are you doing?” Chaeryeong grabs the hem of Yeonjun’s sleeve, tugging him down. “Someone might see you!”

“I damn hope they do.” Yeonjun says, shrugging Chaeryeong’s hand off as he walks to the end of their row.

“Yeonjun! Oh my god,” Chaeryeong closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. She looks to the girl on her left, whom she’s never met before, and says, “He’s fucking insane. I don’t know him.”

Yeonjun stops walking when two of the school’s security stand in his way. “I’d like to have a word with the Director, please.”

“Take your seat till after the announcements are finished.” One of the security guards says.

“Can I talk to him then?” Yeonjun asks.

“Please take your seat.” The other security guard says, grabbing one of Yeonjun’s arms.

Yeonjun shrugs their hand off. He didn’t get a first rank in the Hand-to-Hand Combat elective just to be pushed around by a _security guard_. “Don’t touch me.”

“Take your damn seat.” The security guard says, making another grab for Yeonjun’s arm.

Yeonjun calmly swipes their hand away. “I need to speak to the Director-”

“Choi Yeonjun.” The Director says, his voice echoing on the secondary speakers at the back of the amphitheater.

Yeonjun looks up at the stage, still ten rows away. He straightens up for a salute.

“Sit back down.” The Director says, right into the microphone. “We have hundreds of names to go.”

Yeonjun salutes again, though his entire face is red. “Sir, yes, sir!”

He spins sharply on his heel and walks back down the aisle, ignoring the thousands of eyes that follow him as he does. _I have nothing to be ashamed of. They all know the truth._

_I should be first rank. I_ am _first rank._

“You’re welcome to your opinion,” The Director says, turning his chair to the window behind him that, interestingly enough to Yeonjun, doesn’t have a fake sky scrolling across it. “But it’s only an opinion.”

Yeonjun pulls up his transcript and projects it above the Director’s desk. “I don’t think any other _opinion_ is possible, sir.”

The Director spins around and looks at the string of 1’s all the way down Yeonjun’s transcript. “Am I supposed to be impressed?”

“No, I just want you to be fair. For the sake of the Academy’s credibility.”

The Director laughs, gently swiping Yeonjun’s grades out of the way. “You think good grades make a good captain?”

“I think there’s got to be some point to grades,” Yeonjun says. “Or you wouldn’t record them.”

“We do consider marks when choosing the first rank,” The Director says. “Because we can’t grant it to someone who doesn’t meet the standard, obviously.”

“You _choose_ the first rank?” Yeonjun frowns.

“Of course. We look at their behavior, personality…” The Director says. “…how they’re regarded by their peers, things like that.”

Yeonjun didn’t think anything else could surprise him today, but he was _wrong_.

“You mean to tell me,” Yeonjun says slowly. “That first rank is a _popularity contest_?”

The Director has the fucking gall to laugh at him. “You just don’t _get_ it, Yeonjun. That’s why you can’t be first rank.”

“Our briefing is in room 203.” Chaeryeong says, skipping to walk next to Yeonjun as he storms away from the Director’s office.

Yeonjun takes a deep breath. _I have to be kind to Chaeryeong. I have to be KIND. To Chaeryeong._

He scowls at her. “ _Our_?”

“We’re in the same crew. I mean, you’re the captain, but yeah,” Chaeryeong laughs nervously, backing away from Yeonjun’s gaze. “Everyone else has been kinda waiting for you, so…”

“Oh. Sorry about that.” Yeonjun says. _It’s not like I’ve been doing anything important, right? Like trying to figure out how this goddamn Academy’s ranking system works? The one that will affect the rest of our lives?_

“Yeonjun?” Chaeryeong’s eyes are wide. “You okay?”

Yeonjun decides on a simple, “Yes.”

“Let’s go before the other guys start hating us,” Chaeryeong says. “Before we even get on the ship.”

Yeonjun sighs. “Yeah.”

“ _So_ glad you two could join us,” Instructor Jung says the second Yeonjun slides the door to Room 203 open. “We’ve only been waiting for, how many minutes has it been, Taehyun?”

“Thirty-eight minutes and twenty-three seconds.” A boy sitting to the instructor’s right says, flicking up the holographic display on his watch. “Twenty-five seconds.”

“Thank you, Taehyun.” The instructor turns back to Yeonjun. “Well?”

“Sorry, I was in a meeting with the Director.” Yeonjun says, carefully walking to the far end of the table. The room is egg-shaped, with an egg-shaped table in the center of it. Yeonjun sits at the point of the egg, as far as he can possibly get from his crewmates. He knows it’s futile, since they’ll be trapped in a tiny ship together for the next two months, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t take every last opportunity to get away from them.

“Okay, let’s start so you guys make it to boarding at 1700,” Instructor Jung sighs. He gestures one hand in Yeonjun’s direction. “Welcome to the Rank 3 crew. Your ship’s name is the _EXP Charlie,_ and your captain is Choi Yeonjun, who is a lot nicer than he looks, I promise.”

Yeonjun looks over the table. The only person he knows here is Chaeryeong, whom he knows to be in the medical program. The other girl on their team, who has her dirty boots up on the table, is wearing the mint green jacket of the engineering program, with the lavender of the navigation and communication program, so Yeonjun assumes she must be neither. _Taehyun, the guy with the holo-watch, is wearing all lavender, so he must be_ _our navigations and communications guy, and the other guy…_ Yeonjun frowns. The other guy isn’t even wearing the uniform.

The girl with her boots on the table lifts one boot.

“Yes, Ryujin?” Instructor Jung turns to her with an unsure frown.

“Are we _all_ supposed to be Rank 1, or is our captain the only fluke?”

Instructor Jung takes a deep breath, his eyes meeting Yeonjun’s for an awkward second, before he replies, “There hasn’t been a _fluke_. The Academy’s faculty and school board deliberate on each student-”

“So it’s not from our grades?” Chaeryeong asks.

“No, it’s not.” Yeonjun replies.

“Oh, _that_ explains why I’m here.” The guy who isn’t wearing the uniform snickers.

“Anyway,” Intrsuctor Jung says, clapping his hands together. “Can we finish the introduction? You guys have to be on your ship in two hours.”

“Sure.”

“Okay.”

“Go ahead.”

Yeonjun only shrugs.

“Thank you.” Instructor Jung sighs as he pulls up a hologram of a star map. “As the crew of _EXP Charlie,_ you will be exploring a small area of the Scorpius cluster…”

Yeonjun stops listening. He read all of this on his phone on the way here. He pretends to still listen, for Instructor Jung’s sake, nodding at all the right parts. But he’s busy looking at his crew. _I know they’re not first rank… But why do they look like Rank 200 out of 200?_

“…And, uh, I hope you guys have fun. There are lots of things you need to keep track of and think about – a lot of paperwork, especially for you, Taehyun,” Instructor Jung says, and Taehyun nods aggressively. “But it _is_ fun to see other worlds. It really is. Any questions?”

The guy not wearing the uniform barely raises his hand.

“Yes, Beomgyu?”

“In the case of uh, an emergency…” Beomgyu furrows his brow. “Okay, whatever. If I die, my family gets money from the Academy, right?”

Chaeryeong and Taehyun gasp, while Ryujin starts laughing. “Same!”

Instructor Jung frowns. “I… We’re sending you to a relatively safe region that we actually know enough about, to be sure that you don’t-”

“Yeah, but,” Beomgyu waves her hands. “If I _do_ kick the bucket, my mom and dad will get compensation, right? Just making sure.”

“Yes.” Instructor Jung says with a troubled expression. “But we’re doing everything we can to avoid that.”

“Yeah, you’d better.” Beomgyu chuckles, leaning back in his seat.

“Any other questions?”

Yeonjun raises his hand.

“Yes, Yeonjun?” Instructor Jung says, looking hopefully in Yeonjun’s direction.

“Can we talk?” Yeonjun says. He makes a gesture in the general egg shape of the room. “Alone?”

“You’re supposed to have fifteen minutes to get to know each other,” Instructor Jung says, scrolling through the itinerary on his phone. “We have an icebreaker game-”

“The next two months is _plenty_ to get to know each other.” Yeonjun says. He lifts his eyebrows at his crewmates. “Well?”

Chaeryeong rises to her feet slowly, nudging the boys on either side of her to follow suit. “Come on, guys.”

Ryujin taps her boots on the table, leaving a pile of dirt on the pristine white surface. “Can’t believe we have to listen to this blowhard for two fucking months.”

But she does stand up and follow the other three out the door.

Instructor Jung folds his arms. “Can you at least _try_ to be friendly to them, Yeonjun?”

“I’ll be as friendly as I need to be,” Yeonjun says, waving it off. He looks the instructor in the eye. “You knew, didn’t you? That they would screw me over like this?”

“I…” Instructor Jung sighs. “I _did_ vote for you to be first rank, Yeonjun, but they wouldn’t count my vote.”

“Why not?”

“Because I was the one who nominated you for the scholarship in the first place.” Instructor Jung says. “Conflict of interest.”

“Is that why they made me third rank?” Yeonjun frowns. “Because I’m from _Earth_?”

“No, of course not.” Instructor Jung says. “The people around here aren’t as prejudiced against people from the provinces anymore-”

“Really?” Yeonjun scoffs. “Then why else would they do this to me?”

Instructor Jung is quiet for a long while. “They doubted your leadership capabilities.”

“But I ranked first in-”

“I know. I know you ranked first in everything,” Instructor Jung gives Yeonjun a sad smile. “But grades aren’t everything.”

“Why does everyone keep telling me that?” Yeonjun kicks his chair back in frustration. “This is a _school_. Grades _are_ everything. Otherwise we wouldn’t even have them.”

The instructor walks over and sits down in the chair Chaeryeong had been sitting in. He starts scrolling down his itinerary again. “Your situation isn’t even bad, Yeonjun. You’re ranked third. Out of _two hundred_.”

“I know.” Yeonjun says. “I’m not complaining about _that_ , it’s just that I don’t understand why-”

“And your team is one of the best, believe me.” Instructor Jung scrolls thoughtfully through the contents of his phone. “Look, I’m not supposed to share this with you, but would you like a dossier on your crew?”

“If you’re not allowed to give it, why offer it?”

“Because it looks like you’ll need all the help you can get.” Instructor Jung says.

Yeonjun doesn’t disagree.

“Sorry.”

Yeonjun stops locking his suitcase and turns to his roommate with a frown. “What for?”

“The whole…” Chan shakes his head. “I don’t deserve to be second.”

Yeonjun stares at his roommate for a long time. “Our opinions don’t matter to the Academy’s board.”

“I know, but even so,” Chan slings his backpack over one shoulder. “It doesn’t feel right. I feel like I’m stealing from you.”

“You didn’t make them decide that,” Yeonjun says. _Unlike some other classmates of ours._

“Yeah.” Chan holds out a hand. “Still friends?”

_Friends? Since when?_ Yeonjun doesn’t know what else to do but to shake Chan’s hand. “Okay.”

“Take care out there, man.” Chan says, giving Yeonjun a lazy salute as he heads for the door.

“You too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 🎵 This chapter's tracks from the playlist  
> 1\. [Dream a Little Dream of Me - Doris Day](https://open.spotify.com/track/2HyPrPSANTIPkR6CfiytwY?si=04111fa4365749d0)  
> 2\. [Blue Moon - The Marcels](https://open.spotify.com/track/42ojLX3UYsp4XhaX0sx29E?si=b357613977c940b0)


	2. Flying *Third Class

Yeonjun drums his hands on the armrest of his captain’s chair. “How many minutes has it been, Taehyun?”

Taehyun checks his holo-watch. “Thirty-eight minutes and forty-two seconds, Captain.”

“All the other ships have gone, haven’t they?”

“Uh…” Taehyun taps around his screen. “Not sure, Captain.”

“Yeah, they have.” Chaeryeong says, pointing out the ship’s windshield.

“Oh.” Taehyun looks away from his screen and out the window. The rest of the hangar is empty.

Yeonjun groans, folding over to rest his forehead on the cool metal of the armrest. _We really_ are _200 out of 200 now._

“Do we have any way of contacting the other two?” Yeonjun asks, still face down on the armrest.

“Well, uh,” Taehyun taps around on his screen. “Not until they connect to the ship’s network-”

“I already texted Beomgyu and Ryujin.” Chaeryeong says.

Yeonjun and Taehyun look up and frown at her.

“I got their numbers?” Chaeryeong says, frowning right back at them like it’s the first thing they should’ve thought of.

_Maybe it is._

A notification pops up on Taehyun’s screen. “Beomgyu’s here.”

Yeonjun spins around in his chair when the door behind him slides open. He’s thinking of how best to tell Beomgyu off for being late without pissing the latter off enough that Yeonjun will have to sleep with one eye open.

Beomgyu’s wiping his mouth off on his sleeve. “Hi guys, what’s up?”

“What took you?” Yeonjun asks. _That’s good. Nice and neutral._

“Had to say goodbye to a friend.” Beomgyu winks.

Yeonjun frowns. “But all the other ships are-”

“He’s screwing one of the professors.”

Yeonjun nearly jumps out of his seat, because Shin Ryujin is standing in the doorway, when she hadn’t been _literally_ a second ago.

“Where did you come from?” Taehyun squawks out, frowning at his screen, then at Ryujin, then back at his screen.

“Forgot something in the dorm.” Ryujin shrugs, carrying something wrapped in a rough black cloth.

“What is that?” Yeonjun gets out of his chair. “Ryujin, what-”

“It’s not a weapon, chill out, dude.” Ryujin laughs, waving the bundle. “It got past the detectors.”

“You got past _all_ the detectors.” Taehyun says. “How come you’re not registering on the comms!?”

“Oh, crap, give me a minute, I’ll fix that.” Ryujin lowers the bundle on Yeonjun’s armrest. Then she pulls her sleeve up. There’s a silver line in her arm that looks curiously like a zipper.

Chaeryeong stands up. “What-”

Ryujin unzips the zipper, revealing bright reddish pink flesh underneath. She pulls out a tiny chip the size of a pill, squeezes it until it lights up, then drops it back in.

Chaeryeong faints clean away, hitting the floor of the bridge with a loud thud.

“What’s her problem?” Ryujin asks.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“Lee Chaeryeong you know already,” Instructor Jung said. “She’s the other recipient of the Earth Provincial Scholarship, and she’s top 3 of the medical majors. She actually ranked first in the written exams-”_

_“Like me?”_

_“Uh… yes and no. She’s excellent at written exams, but uh, not so consistent with practical exams.”_

_“What do you mean?”_

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun’s starting to consider turning the ship around if Chaeryeong doesn’t wake up soon. She hadn’t been _strictly_ necessary for takeoff, and her vital signs, according to the tracker in her arm, had been stable.

_But something’s wrong._

He pulls up the comms channel. “Ryujin?”

“Yo.”

Yeonjun sighs. He doesn’t know if his pilot’s just trying to get under his skin – a lot of people in the pilot program resent their counterparts in the captain program, since they’re basically taking the same classes but with more prestige.

Chaeryeong’s eyes flutter open before Yeonjun can give Ryujin the order. “Oh my _god_.”

“Are you okay?” Yeonjun asks.

“Yeah, I…” Chaeryeong sits up with a dazed giggle. “I just get a little woozy when I see blood.”

Yeonjun stares at her. “You are a medical major.”

“Yes I am.” Chaeryeong agrees. “What about it?”

“Don’t you have to… see blood… often?”

“Uh, eh, yeah, haha,” Chaeryeong snorts. “About that… Anyway, Instructor Jung said we’re going to a safe place anyway, so no one’s going to get injured like that, so we won’t have any problems, right?”

Yeonjun just stares at her.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“Shin Ryujin is a Mooner – I mean, she’s from Sector 5 of New Moon City. She was ranked first among the pilot majors until last year.”_

_“What happened last year?”_

_“I don’t know, but she’s still consistently in the top 5. She’s a prodigy. She can pilot one of the microships – like the one you’re getting – with her eyes closed. And she has.”_

_“What?”_

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Hey,” Ryujin says, hopping out of Yeonjun’s seat when he returns to the bridge.

Yeonjun frowns at the dirty boot marks on his white seat. He can’t even fathom how Ryujin’s boots had gotten so dirty to begin with, when the university is one of the cleanest places he’s ever been to. “I think it’s not too late to set some house rules.”

“Aww, does that make us housemates?” Beomgyu says from where he’s clearly reading a comic on Taehyun’s navigation screen.

Taehyun’s at Chaeryeong’s seat, poking at what looks like Ryujin’s vital stats. Whatever they are, all the metrics are in the red, and alerts are popping up faster than Taehyun can close them.

Yeonjun frowns at him. “Rule number one: No switching seats around. Everyone stays in their own seat.”

“What?” Beomgyu makes a face. “My chair has a smaller screen-”

“What if the other person’s not even here anyway-” Ryujin starts.

“I was just trying to fill in for Chaeryeong-” Taehyun explains.

“You heard the Captain.” Chaeryeong says, clapping her hands together urgently. “Back to your own seats.”

Their crewmates trudge glumly back to their designated seats like a slow, boring game of musical chairs.

“Thanks, Chaeryeong.” Yeonjun says.

Ryujin slouches in her chair and lifts one dirty boot over her head.

Yeonjun frowns at her. “Uh, do you have something to say, Ryujin?”

“Yeah.” Ryujin lowers her foot. “What’s rule number two?”

Yeonjun sighs.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“Choi Beomgyu is also from New Moon City, Sector 5. He’s something of a dark horse, really. He was always somewhere around the top 20’s of the engineering majors, until late last semester, when he suddenly shot to first.”_

_“What did he do?”_

_“Don’t know, but he must be really diligent, I guess.”_

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“It’s not true.” Beomgyu says, blocking Yeonjun’s way. Yeonjun had just finished using the toilet – which the five of them somehow have to share for the next two months without killing each other. Yeonjun can’t picture how.

“ _What’s_ not true?”

“I wasn’t sleeping with any of my professors.” Beomgyu says.

Yeonjun tries to keep his expression neutral. “I never said-”

“It’s not ‘sleeping with’ per se if you just given them a _little_ suck under the desk,” Beomgyu says. “Not technically.”

Yeonjun has half a mind to return to the toilet and pour some strong bleach into his brain. “I. Never. Asked.”

“I don’t believe professors should have relationships with their students, it’s just not professional.” Beomgyu says. “Giving head isn’t a relationship, it’s just… trade and barter.”

Yeonjun sighs. “Are you done?”

Beomgyu pouts. “Please don’t think less of me, Captain.”

“I don’t.” Yeonjun admits. His opinion of Beomgyu had started at the floor, and for the other guy’s sake, he’s not going to lower it further.

“Aw, thanks, Cappy.” Beomgyu grins. “Can I call you that? _Cappy_?”

“No.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“Kang Taehyun’s mom is from Earth, but his dad is from New Moon City, Sector 2.”_

_Yeonjun’s eyebrows rose._

_“His father’s the head of the Information Board,” Instructor Jung said. “But Taehyun's a good student in his own right. He’s excellent at troubleshooting and he knows ten languages.”_

_“Ten?”_

_“Yes.” Instructor Jung’s smile grew less confident. “It can work against him sometimes, though.”_

_“How so?”_

_“Never mind.”_

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“What’s our ETA for the Scorpius cluster?” Yeonjun asks. He’s only been imprisoned with his crew for five hours, and he already wants to tap out.

“Uh…”

Yeonjun drums his fingers on his armrest while waiting. He looks over the other the crew members. Chaeryeong’s rewriting an incident report about her own passing out. Yeonjun had told her to be as brief as possible, and she’d written just two words on the form: _Chaeryeong fainted._

Ryujin’s using her feet to adjust the ship’s thrusters. Yeonjun had confiscated her boots an hour ago, wrapping them in a plastic bag and tossing them in his locker. She’s been driving with her bare feet (her socks are lying on the floor next to her) since then, but they miraculously haven’t gone off course… _yet_.

Beomgyu is frowning at his screen, typing some code that he’d told Yeonjun was to refine the ship’s autopilot so nobody has to smell Ryujin’s feet anymore. Yeonjun would appreciate the effort, if Beomgyu didn’t stop coding every five seconds to read comics in another tab.

Taehyun has been staring at his screen all this time, not moving a single muscle.

“Taehyun?” Yeonjun asks in mild concern. “I’ll take even a rough ETA. Days are fine.”

“ _DAYS_!” Taehyun shouts, making Ryujin jump and kick one of the thrusters into overdrive.

“RYUJIN!” Beomgyu yells, holding onto his chair as the ship spins around, forming a donut in space.

“MAKE IT STOP!” Chaeryeong’s starting to turn green.

“WAIT, I’M TRYING-”

Yeonjun closes his eyes and starts typing into his keypad.

The ship shudders to a halt, sending Beomgyu and Ryujin flying into the windshield.

“Rule number two: Wear your seatbelt at all times.” Yeonjun says quietly.

“Fuck you.” Beomgyu flips him the bird.

Yeonjun’s about to say something when the heap on the floor that is Ryujin groans. “It’s Taehyun’s fault he fucking scared me!”

“Sorry, everyone.” Taehyun says. “I just forgot the word for _days_.”

Yeonjun stares at him for a long, long time.

“Our ETA is six _days_.” Taehyun says. He knocks on his skull, like he’s hammering the word in. “ _Days, days, days_ …”

Yeonjun, whose posture is usually so good he’s gotten complimented on it, slouches in his seat. _Six days. Six whole days of nothing but these four. Six WHOLE days._

_I’m going to die._

Yeonjun shuts his eyes. _At least Mama and Papa will get compensation when I do._

> _Dear Mama and Papa,_
> 
> _I would record a voice message to send home, but there is no privacy here at all. Personal space is a distant memory I can only imagine._
> 
> _Don’t get me wrong, though. I am well and healthy, and the mission is going well._
> 
> _The ship itself is very nice, a brand-new microship. I know Mama wants to hear about the specifics, so you can skip the next part, Papa:_
> 
> _The bridge is around the size of our living room, and it’s the highest level of the ship. The one bathroom is located just next to the bridge, though I don’t understand the logic behind that. One level below is the living area, which is a little wider than the bridge by a few square meters. It has a kitchenette and a round table in the center. The room is shaped like a hexagon, with our beds in shelves the wall like the beds on the express shuttle to the Moon. The sixth wall has a window. I make it a point to keep the window’s screen off, but someone keeps switching it on. The lowest level houses the engine and the loading bay. I have been down there probably more times than a captain should, because our engineer has a habit of disappearing suddenly._
> 
> _Actually, our pilot also disappears quite often. I don’t know how they do it on such a small ship, but_

“Hey, Yeonj- I mean, Captain?”

Yeonjun quickly hides the email he’d been trying out for his parents. “Yes?”

“I was wondering if we could uh, make a deal when it comes to making calls,” Chaeryeong says. “Like designate some time per person so there’s privacy?”

“Oh, so you can call home?” Yeonjun asks.

“Y- Yeah, sure.”

Beomgyu spins around in his seat. “She’s going to call her boyfriend, Cappy.”

“I am your _Captain_ , Beomgyu, not anything else.” Yeonjun snaps. He turns back to Chaeryeong, whose face has gone a bright shade of pink. “Sure, you can go downstairs and make a call. Nobody will bother you, unless we have an emergency.”

Chaeryeong smiles. “Thanks, Captain.”

“Turn off your comms before you call boyfie,” Beomgyu says, sticking out his tongue.

Chaeryeong curls a fist at him. “Choi Beomgyu, if you don’t stop-”

“I’m turning them off for you.” Taehyun says with a grimace.

“We’re not going to do anything _weird_!” Chaeryeong crosses her arms.

“Oh yeah? So why do you have to go to another room to make the call?” Ryujin asks.

Chaeryeong stomps one foot. “You’re just jealous because you have no one to call-”

“I’ll have you know, I have _plenty_ of people calling me,” Ryujin says, pretending to check her nails. “I’m just ignoring them.”

“Who? Loan sharks?” Beomgyu lifts his eyebrows as he flips through his comics.

“Hey, _Comms boy_ , can you cut Beomgyu’s connection to the internet?” Ryujin says, snapping her fingers at Taehyun.

“I have a name, you know?” Taehyun says, scowling at her. “Besides, the internet’s down.”

Yeonjun frowns. _But my email…_ “What do you mean?”

“Something’s up with our connection back to the Academy.” Taehyun says. “I’m working on it.”

“So I can’t call?” Chaeryeong’s shoulders sag.

“No, you can still call the other ships,” Taehyun says. “Your boyfriend’s on one of the other ships, right?”

“He’s in _EXP Bravo_.” Beomgyu says. He puts up a V sign. “Rank 2.”

“How do you know that?” Chaeryeong frowns at him.

Beomgyu spins around in his chair, giving her an unfriendly smile. “I wouldn’t lock myself in a ship with four other people without knowing a thing or two about them.”

 _Makes sense._ Yeonjun frowns at himself. _Why am I agreeing with Beomgyu? What the fuck?_

“What dirt do you have on the Captain?” Ryujin asks, pointing one of her boots at Yeonjun (He’d caved and returned them to her the day before. It had not been his proudest moment).

Beomgyu swivels to face Yeonjun. His mouth curls into a grin that scares Yeonjun a little. Then Yeonjun remembers that he never actually did anything that a person like Beomgyu would find interesting, and he has _nothing_ to worry about.

“He’s got a thing with Kim Soobin.” Beomgyu says. “Am I wrong?”

“Yes. Very.” Yeonjun says. “Soobin and I don’t even know each other.”

“Then why are you on a first-name basis?” Taehyun asks.

“Oh ho ho, nice one, Comms boy.” Ryujin says, reaching out a hand for a high five.

“I have a _name_.”

“They’re just classmates,” Chaeryeong says firmly, before turning to Yeonjun. “Right?”

“Yes.” Yeonjun says. “Just classmates.”

Beomgyu’s smile doesn’t look convinced.

“Don’t you have work to do?” Yeonjun grumbles, turning his seat away from his crewmates. “Everybody get back to your stations.”


	3. Look at the Stars

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Mama, what do the stars look like?”

Yeonjun had just started school, and they’d learned an old song called _Twinkle, Twinkle._ Like a lot of the nursery rhymes his teacher was making them learn, it hadn’t made any sense to him. His teacher had told him to ask his mother when he got home, since his mother was the only person in their entire dome who’s ever been off Earth.

“Imagine the sky is a big, thick blanket,” Yeonjun’s mother said, lifting one of Yeonjun’s rough brown bedhseets. She threw the sheet over them both, making Yeonjun laugh. “And there’s a light shining behind it.”

Yeonjun squinted at the tiny gaps in the woven sheet, the polka dots of light from the strip lighting in the dome’s ceiling above. He reached up and grazed his finger over them, blotting them out with his tiny index finger. “There are this many stars?”

“There are more.” Yeonjun’s mom took the blanket off them to fold it along with the rest of the laundry. She’d looked up at the blank, grayish-brown sky above their dome. “One day, I’ll take you to the Moon so you can see them.”

Yeonjun smiled.

The shuttle from the Earth to the Moon ran 24 hours a day, seven days a week, ferrying food to the citizens on the Moon, and returning waste from the Moon for composting and recycling. Yeonjun had spent many afternoons at the quay near their dome, since his mother was the head engineer there. He would watch the liftoffs from the safety of the quay’s soundproofed dome, pressing his nose flat against the glass until he could feel the heat from the shuttle’s rockets.

“You behave yourself out there,” Yeonjun’s father said, zipping up Yeonjun’s heavy winter coat. “The Mooners aren’t kind people.”

“Not all of them are bad,” Yeonjun’s mother said, circling around Yeonjun’s cart to check if all his things were there. It was just one suitcase full of clothes and a box of freeze-dried food that would last him the semester. “Just study hard.”

“He’s _always_ studied hard,” Yeonjun’s grandmother sighed, patting Yeonjun on the back. His winter coat was so thick he barely felt it. “You won’t have any competition. Mooners are lazy.”

“Don’t you dare become like them.” Yeonjun’s uncle said, giving Yeonjun a rougher pat on the back. “We won’t let you back in the dome if-”

A muffled announcement over the quay’s PA system cut his uncle off then. Yeonjun didn’t understand what it had been exactly, but his mother went in for a hug right after hearing it.

“You call us, okay? And if you can’t call-”

“I’ll send an email, Mama,” Yeonjun said. “Like when I was in college.”

“Yes.” Yeonjun’s mother cupped his ears in her hands, leaning forward to give him a kiss on the nose. “You take care, okay?”

“Yes, Mama.”

Yeonjun wondered why no one was taking any of the window seats in the shuttle. The other hundreds of people on the ship were mostly construction workers and shipmen, and he figured they’d seen a launch several times before. _The magic must be lost on them._

_But not for me._ Yeonjun strapped himself in excitedly.

The entire shuttle began to rattle, like there was an earthquake, but none of the other passengers seemed bothered. So Yeonjun gripped his armrests and tried to act cool.

Then there was this noise, this loud roar that rattled Yeonjun’s entire ribcage. Before he could get used to it, though, the shuttle lurched forward (it had turned them all onto their side to lay down just a few minutes before). Yeonjun felt all of his insides get throttled around, and he was beginning to feel ill, but he was having too much fun to notice at the moment.

There’s a feeling you get on a swing, if you build up enough power that the swing launches you up to the sky. It tickles so much that it’s a little bit painful, but it’s a wonderful feeling just the same.

What Yeonjun felt on his first launch was like that, but a thousand times over.

When the uneasy feeling in his stomach finally settled, and his feet touched the floor of the shuttle again, Yeonjun peeked one eye open.

A tear rolled down his cheek. He hadn’t realized he had screwed his eyes shut _that_ tightly.

Then Yeonjun realized the strange light in the cabin now, a kind of bright darkness he’d never seen before.

He turned to his window to see darkness stretching out in every direction, dotted with tiny, dancing lights.

Then the lights in the cabin came on, along with a display of blue nothingness and puffy white clouds in every window.

Yeonjun frowned. _What the hell is this?_

“Oh, is it broken?”

Yeonjun turned away from the window to find someone standing in the doorway. _My roommate for the next four years. Bang Chan._ Yeonjun had seen his name in the information on his dorm room, along with his address in Sector 4 of New Moon City.

_So he must know I’m from Earth._ Yeonjun straightened up defensively. “No, it’s not.”

“Let me at it,” Chan dropped all his bags in the doorway and walked over. He reached under the window frame and pressed the button that brought up the window’s settings. “Oh, someone had just turned it off.”

_Yes. It was me,_ Yeonjun thought, frowning as the comforting darkness of space outside was replaced with that same artificial blue light.

“Just like home, right?” Chan asked.

Yeonjun only watched as a tree came into view, greener and more symmetrical than any tree _he’d_ ever seen, followed by rows of small, reddish-orange houses that looked nothing like their half-basement houses back home. “No. I would rather have it off.”

“Oh.” Chan’s fingers hovered uneasily over the window’s controls. “I don’t like leaving it off… It’s kinda scary.”

Yeonjun sighed. He hadn’t expected Mooners to be _this_ weak and sad. “I don’t really mind, actually. Either way is fine.”

“Oh, great.” Chan pressed the button to hide the window’s control panel again. “I’m Bang Chan, by the way.”

_I know._ Yeonjun gave in and shook the hand his roommate had extended to him.

“Choi Yeonjun.”

_But you knew that already._

Yeonjun had a hard time with his classes in his first semester, not because they were actually difficult, but because the Mooners spoke so quickly and so _much_ without saying anything at all.

“I, ah, uh, er,” Yeonjun’s professor in Introduction to History went, as he often did. Yeonjun’s Language professor in his college back home would have marked this Mooner professor below zero, or kicked him out of the classroom from sheer annoyance. “I’ll let you all pick your partners for the project, since you know each other already.”

Yeonjun had nearly snapped his stylus then. _No, we don’t. We’ve only been here two weeks._

He’d looked around to see everyone calling out to or smacking each other.

“Hey, we’re partners, okay?”

“I call dibs on her!”

“Not fair!”

“Let’s just be partners.”

Yeonjun watched them all move away from him, like the tide. It wasn’t fair. All of them had gone to the same colleges, many even in Pre-Academy programs that Yeonjun hadn’t known had existed.

“Hiya,”

Yeonjun looked up with a frown. Whoever was talking to him was really tall, and silhouetted against the harsh light above.

“Do you have a partner yet?” They asked.

“No.” Yeonjun stood up, studying the other person’s face warily.

“Great.” The other person smiled. “Let’s be partners.”

“Okay.”

Yeonjun felt dizzy from looking right at his eyes. They were dark, like most people’s, but they seemed to reflect the hospital-like lights of the auditorium in little, twinkling flecks.

“I’m Soobin, uh, in case you didn’t know.”

Yeonjun didn’t. “I’m Yeonjun.”

Yeonjun came from a long line of farmers and engineers. He believed in the scientific method. So every time he met up with Soobin for the History project, he would check if the latter had the stars in his eyes again.

The answer was always yes.

Yeonjun squinted at his own reflection in the bathroom mirror. The lights in the bathroom were much brighter than the ones in the classroom, but no matter how he screwed his eyes, he could never get them to sparkle like Soobin’s.

“You okay, man?”

Yeonjun straightened up then, looking at the other reflection in the mirror. His roommate was standing next to him, carrying a toothbrush and a towel, and Yeonjun hadn’t even noticed.

“Yes.”

“If you’ve got something in your eye, just cup some water in your hand and blink into it a couple of times,” Chan had demonstrated it in the sink next to Yeonjun’s. He’d looked up at Yeonjun with a wide smile and water dribbling down his face. “Like that.”

Yeonjun realized two things. One, that Chan must think he’s pretty stupid, and two, that no one, not even Chan with his face covered in water, has eyes like Soobin’s.

“Hey, Soobin, you busy?”

Yeonjun hadn’t even looked up from the book he’d been reading on his tablet. This was the fourth person to bother Soobin, and they’d only been in the library for all of fifteen minutes.

“Yeah, I’m doing the History project,” Soobin said, but he just _had_ to add, “Why?”

The bothersome girl pulled back the chair next to him and sat down. “Nothing, can I study with you?”

“Oh, uh, sure.” Soobin looked across the table at Yeonjun then. “It’s okay with you, right?”

Yeonjun just nodded without looking up from his book. He didn’t care enough to argue, and besides, if this girl really wanted to bother Soobin, it didn’t seem like anything Yeonjun said or did would’ve stopped her.

“Me and a couple of our other classmates are going out for dinner later,” The girl said. “You wanna come with?”

“Sure, we’ll be finished by then. You coming too, Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun looked up and frowned right into Soobin’s shimmering eyes. _We will_ not _be finished with the project by then._

“I don’t know.” Was what Yeonjun decided to say.

“He’ll be there.” Soobin told the girl.

“Oh, cool.” The girl said, though it didn’t sound like she’d convinced herself. She stood up. “I’ll dm you the place later.”

“Sure.” Soobin waved at her as she walked away. Then he’d looked at Yeonjun and laughed. “Why’s your face like that?”

“Like what?”

Soobin just laughed again. “Let’s go somewhere with less people.”

Yeonjun had to agree.

Soobin touched his finger to the doorknob and stood aside to let Yeonjun go in first. “Uh, it’s kind of a mess.”

Yeonjun hadn’t been to anyone else’s dorm room but his own. Not entirely because it was against the Academy’s regulations, but also because he had no reason to be going into other people’s rooms.

But Soobin’s dorm room was so much different from Yeonjun’s that Yeonjun suddenly needed to know whose was the average one, and whose was the outlier.

Soobin’s room was probably as big as Yeonjun’s entire house. It had a sitting area with two armchairs and two desks, a kitchenette with a stove and range hood, a single giant bed behind a translucent divider, and a holographic projection of the night sky on the ceiling.

“You don’t have a roommate?” Yeonjun asked.

“Oh, uh, no.” Soobin lifted a pile of clothes off one of the chairs. “Sorry, the housekeeping haven’t been by today yet.”

Yeonjun hadn’t moved an inch. “Housekeeping?”

“The uh, the people who clean the dorms?” Soobin shoved everything one on of the desks off to one side. “Here, you can use this one.”

Yeonjun took off his shoes and walked over slowly, as if he were worried his socks would leave grimy marks on the floor. “Thanks.”

“Sure thing.” Soobin smiled at him then, his eyes twinkling like the sky above.

Yeonjun feels his face heating up, so he turns to the view on Soobin’s ceiling. “Is this a screen?”

“Oh, did you want the screen?” Soobin snapped his fingers, and the ceiling changed to a placid, cloudy blue.

“No, I don’t like it.” Yeonjun said.

“Me neither.” Soobin snapped his fingers again. The blue sky faded into darkness. Yeonjun realized then that it wasn’t a projection – Soobin’s ceiling was a glass dome. “My dad says the screens look nothing like Earth anyway.”

“They don’t.” Yeonjun stopped and frowned. “Your dad’s from Earth?”

“Yeah.”

Yeonjun had figured that with a room like this – _definitely_ the outlier – Soobin’s parents must be Sector 1 Mooners. _I guess I was wrong._

Yeonjun borrowed a jacket from Soobin, since the latter had said his winter coat was “too much for dinner.” Yeonjun had tried to complain that walking around the Moon felt like being inside a meat locker, but Soobin didn’t know what a meat locker was.

“Hey everyone, sorry I’m late,” Soobin said as soon as they’d entered the restaurant. Nine of their classmates in the captain program were already sitting at a long table, eating tiny snacks on tiny plates.

They all stopped the minute Soobin had entered, and got up to give him their seat. One of them called the waiter, snapping their fingers angrily at how slow he was being. Another took Soobin’s jacket from him, promising to take good care of it until later. Yet another went and poured Soobin a glass of water that Soobin was trying to politely decline.

Yeonjun stood there, not understanding why they were all treating Soobin like he was their grandma. _But I don’t presume to understand Mooners._

It was another five minutes before they realized Yeonjun had nowhere to sit, and pulled up a stool from a nearby table for him to perch on while the rest of them leaned against their backrests.

“How’s your dad, Soobin?”

“He’s… fine?”

“My dad sends his regards.”

“Oh, uh, thanks, I’ll tell him.”

It’s that much more obvious, when he’s surrounded by all these people hanging on his every word, that Soobin’s eyes are different from everyone else’s. They’re dark, but they’re brighter, and they really do catch the light strangely.

“What does your dad do, Yeonjun?” Soobin asked.

Yeonjun was glad he didn’t have food, because he would have choked on it. “S- Sorry, what?”

The guy to his left nudges him. “What does your dad do?”

“Oh. He’s a farmer.”

The table fell silent.

“What do you guys farm?” Soobin asked.

“We, uh…” Yeonjun didn’t like having them all look at him like this. “We grow soy and wheat.”

Soobin laughs. “Like bread?”

“Yes, like bread.” Yeonjun just wanted them all to stop looking at him like he was a small animal on the side of the road. “My mama’s not a farmer, though. She’s an engineer. She used to work for the Exploration Fleet.”

“Really?” Soobin asked.

“There’s never been an engineer from _Earth_ in the Fleet.” One of the girls said.

“Are you sure?” Another girl asked.

“Yeah, we would’ve heard about it.” The first girl said. “There are lots of Earthers in the ground crew.”

Yeonjun nodded. “I think she was in the ground crew.”

“Like, a janitor?”

“There are ground crew who aren’t janitors.”

“All the Earthers are janitors.”

“Stop calling them Earthers.”

Yeonjun felt sick, so he sat through the rest of the dinner without having a single bite. Not that anyone offered any to him, anyway.

“Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun kept walking. He was hungry and tired and didn’t want to deal with anyone. It was nearly the end of the night this week, and even with the warmth radiating from the heaters underneath the sidewalk, he was shivering. He didn’t think he’d ever get used to just how cold it got on the Moon. Everyone else had gone home in their light jackets, but Yeonjun just couldn’t stop thinking about his winter coat.

Soobin caught up to him eventually. “Yeonjun, I’m so-”

“I don’t need this anymore.” Yeonjun shrugs Soobin’s jacket off and holds it out to him.

“No, keep it. I have others.”

“I don’t want it.” Yeonjun said, pushing the coat into Soobin’s arms. “I want my coat back.”

“Okay, but it’s in my room.”

“You can give it back to me on Monday morning.” Yeonjun said.

“I, uh, I won’t be here all week next week.”

Yeonjun frowned, setting his jaw so his teeth wouldn’t chatter. “What do you mean?”

“I… I have a family thing.”

“Our History project is due next week.”

“Yeah, about that…” Soobin ran a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry, Yeonjun, I didn’t know I would have to go to this… thing.”

“Is it an emergency?”

“Not exactly…”

Yeonjun shook his head. “This project is 30% of our grade.”

“I know, but I can’t say no to my family.” Soobin said. “You get that, right?”

Yeonjun sighed. “Yes.”

“Thanks, Yeonjun, I knew you’d understand. See you when I get back!”

Yeonjun didn’t really, but Soobin had already left him.

Yeonjun had shown up to their first final exam two weeks later, ready to tell Soobin that they had gotten a perfect score on the project, but Yeonjun had flunked him on the peer evaluation. _As was only right._

He checked the seat assignments for the exam, pleasantly surprised to find that Soobin was in the same room as he was.

He walked into the room to find it almost full. Actually, there were only two seats vacant near the far window.

He sat down in his assigned seat with a troubled frown.

“Ah, relax, Yeonjun, you studied _all_ night. You’ll do great.”

Yeonjun looked across the aisle to find Chan giving him two thumbs up. _That’s not…_

“Thanks.” Yeonjun said anyway. There was no explaining things to Bang Chan, anyway. “Good luck, too.”

“Damn, I’m gonna _need_ it.” Chan laughed.

“Everyone settle down, we’ll start the first exam in a few minutes.” One of the instructors said, walking into the room with a cart full of tablets hovering behind her. “Is everyone here?”

One of the girls raised her hand. “Kim Soobin’s not here, ma’am!”

“Ah,” The instructor looked at the empty seat behind Yeonjun. “I believe he’s made arrangements to take his final exams at his family residence.”

Yeonjun felt like she was speaking another language. _What does that mean?_

Yeonjun learned what she meant a week later. Chan had actually woken up before his alarm, shaking Yeonjun awake until the later glared at him. They’d gone to the Academy’s lobby to watch the wall display change to the program ranks for the first semester. The upperclassmen called it a _Rank Drop_ , according to Chan.

Yeonjun was used to the school posting the ranks, but his college had never had _this_ much fanfare about it.

“I can’t see anything, can you see?” Chan asked, standing on his tiptoes.

Yeonjun craned his neck a little bit. The display went dark, then flashed with a bright light. The five programs had one massive column each in the programs’ respective colors, with the captain program at the center in a stark, eye-searing white. The crowd in the lobby lurched forward to read the names, but Yeonjun didn’t ace the eye exam for _nothing._

He scanned from the middle – _surely Chan isn’t lower than 100_ – and moved upward.

“You’re twenty-third.” Yeonjun told Chan.

“Holy crapoly, that’s _high_.” Chan laughed. “How did you do?”

Yeonjun kept scanning up.

_2 - Choi Yeonjun_

Yeonjun felt pride bloom in his chest for only a moment. Because he saw whose name was above his.

_1 - Kim Soobin_

Beside each name were their marks in every class, and Yeonjun looked for Soobin’s grade in History.

_100%._

_No. There is_ no _way._

“Professor Yoon, did you receive my peer evaluation email?” Yeonjun asked, jogging after their History professor later that afternoon while the latter was on his way to his car.

The History professor started taking longer strides, eyes trained on his car just a few steps away. “I, ah, er, yes, of course, Mr. Choi, didn’t I acknowledge it?”

“You did.” Yeonjun said, standing between the History professor and his car.

“So, uh, ah, eh, what seems to be the problem?”

“I gave Kim Soobin 1/10 for his contribution to the project.”

The History professor blanched. “Well, you see, that was quite _mean_ of you, considering Mr. Kim gave you a full 10/10-”

“I did the entire project, professor, save for a _single paragraph._ ” Yeonjun said, suddenly not feeling cold anymore. He was so angry that he wouldn’t have been surprised if the professor had seen steam coming out of his ears. “Soobin only wrote a _single_ paragraph, and I had to edit it-”

“Ah, er, I’m sorry, Mr. Choi, but I have to go-”

“ _How could he get 100% in your class?_ ” Yeonjun immediately felt bad for raising his voice at the professor. He knew his mother would’ve had _words_ for him if she knew.

“Well that’s…” The History professor began to sweat, even in the wintry chill of the Moon’s outdoors. “It’s bigger than us, Mr. Choi.”

“What does that mean, sir?”

“Ah, eh, I’m sorry, my dear boy.” The History professor fiddled with the key hub for his car. “I’m sorry you got caught in the crossfire.”

Yeonjun frowned at his History professor then. _What the hell is he talking about?_

“I don’t follow, sir.”

“You’re a hardworking kid, Mr. Choi. Don’t let these things get you down.” The History professor said, before getting into his car and driving off.

Yeonjun was left standing in the parking lot, shaking in the cold.

Yeonjun gave the soy curds he was straining one last shake before lowering them into a new container.

“Yeonjun!” His grandma yelled from inside the house. Only her voice could carry out from the basement.

“Coming!” Yeonjun shouted back, drying his hands on his apron as he ran into the house.

“The signal got cut!” His grandma pointed at her black screen. “The General was about to talk.”

Yeonjun nodded placidly as he checked the router. His grandma was probably the biggest General fan on the entire Earth. Yeonjun personally had no opinions on the General, who was so high and lofty that nothing he did actually mattered to Yeonjun, but he’d be dead if he said that to his grandmother.

Yeonjun whacked the router on its side.

The screen blinked back to life, and the dark living room is filled with the General’s warm voice.

“…we are joined by our closest friends and family to celebrate, be thankful, and most importantly, to _eat_.” The General paused to let the laughter from the audience roll over.

Yeonjun’s grandma kept laughing even when the General started speaking again. Yeonjun smiled at her as she slapped her knees.

“He’s the best General we’ve ever had,” His grandma said, wiping a tear from one eye. “You just wouldn’t know.”

“Well, no, Grandma, he’s been in office my whole life.” Yeonjun reminded her.

“And he’s easy on the eyes to boot,” Yeonjun’s grandma said, making a wide gesture at the screen. “It’s too bad his wife’s plain-looking, so all the children are plain, too.”

Yeonjun was about to protest in defense of the poor First Lady and the rest of the First Family, when he noticed something on the screen. The camera was focused on the General, of course, as he continued his address, which sounded more like stand-up comedy than anything else, but Yeonjun didn’t care about him. The General’s family was seated behind him. The First Lady sat with her hands folded in her lap, and her mouth in an unamused, red line. Her elder two daughters looked the same, all angles and stiff cloths and straight backs, but her youngest child seemed to be getting tired. He slouched a little bit in his seat, then seemed to notice that he was seen in the live feed, and straightened up with a self-conscious smile.

Even though he was far from being in focus, his eyes sparkled.

Yeonjun’s breath caught in his throat.

“Oh, I take it back,” Yeonjun’s grandma chuckled. “The General’s son is quite handsome, too.”

“Oh, you want to talk to Yeonjun?” Chan was leaning half out of the door of their dorm room, talking to someone. “Okay.”

Yeonjun had already looked up from the reading he’d been trying to get through. “Who is it?”

“Uh…” Chan just hitched a thumb at the door. “I wouldn’t keep him waiting.”

Yeonjun scowled as he stuffed his feet into his sneakers and stepped out. “Hi, Soobin.”

“Hi.” Soobin holds out Yeonjun’s winter coat. “I had it laundered-”

“Thanks.” Yeonjun takes the coat and holds it close to his chest. _Thank the heavens. I won’t be freezing to death this semester._

His parents had thrown a fit when he’d come home without it.

_“That was expensive!”_

_“We can’t just buy you another one!”_

Soobin ran a hand through his hair. “Uh, thanks for pulling through on the History project.”

Yeonjun glared at him. _No thanks to whom?_

“Oh, and congrats on second.”

Yeonjun curled his hands into fists. _No thanks to WHOM_?

“Guess I’ll see you in class, then?” Soobin said with a smug grin. “This semester’s going to be fun.”

Yeonjun turned on his heel and closed the dorm room door on Soobin. He’d had enough.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone wants to know: In this universe, "university" is a two-year program after high school, which is three years ... ok in short: basic education in this universe is only 10 years total instead of 16-ish (including college) and everyone starts school at like 5 years old because EfFicIeNCY. Is this important to the story? Not really, it's just that the characters are around 19/20 years old at the present time of this fic.


	4. Chaeryeong’s in charge

Yeonjun is standing by the ship’s oven, waiting for his dinner to cook, when he notices another face in the reflection on the oven door.

“Yes, Taehyun?”

“N- Nothing.” Taehyun spins around, like he’s looking for somewhere to hide, but the furniture in the ship’s common area is so sparse that he has no options. He gives Yeonjun a sheepish smile. “Uh, I just wanted to ask what the General’s son is like these days.”

Yeonjun chooses his words carefully. “A selfish, entitled prick. Why?”

“Oh.” Taehyun frowns. “We were friends in uh… what’s the word for… _kindergarten_. He wasn’t like that.”

“Perhaps he hadn’t figured out yet that he could get whatever he wanted if he just asked.” Yeonjun says. The oven lets out a gentle chime, and Yeonjun opens it up.

Yeonjun turns to Taehyun, who’s looking at him with wide, expectant eyes. Yeonjun frowns at him. “What?”

The curtain to Ryujin’s bed-shelf swings open. “What’s that?”

“ _My_ dinner.” Yeonjun says.

Beomgyu pulls the curtain of his own bed-shelf back. “You didn’t make enough for all of us?”

“No.” Yeonjun says. “That’s not in my job description.”

Taehyun sighs deeply.

“We all passed the basic survival course.” Yeonjun grabs a silicone mitt to lift his tray of steaming food out of the oven. “Make your own dinner.”

The door to the common area slides open. Chaeryeong skips in with a wide grin. “Oooh, who cooked dinner?”

“I did.” Yeonjun says, placing a mat on the table before lowering his tray onto it.

“For _himself_.” Beomgyu says, crossing his arms.

“As we should all do for ourselves.” Yeonjun picks up his spoon and scoops some perfectly steamed rice into his mouth. He chews and swallows before adding, “We’re all adults here.”

Chaeryeong pouts. “Oh come _on_.”

“Fuck this.” Ryujin hops out of her bed-shelf. “Fuck our fucking captain.”

Taehyun frowns at her. “Ryujin.”

“I’m fucking hungry, Comms boy, don’t start with me.” Ryujin pulls up the pantry’s control panel open and scrolls through the options. “What do you guys want to eat?”

“You’ll make dinner for everyone?” Beomgyu slides out of his own bed-shelf, a bright smile on his face.

“Everyone except our stupid, selfish captain.” Ryujin says.

Yeonjun stops chewing to frown at Ryujin, who flips him off.

Ryujin tugs an induction cooker out of the wall and places some pot she’s found on it. “What do you guys think about soup? Engineer boy, how much noodles do we have for the trip?”

“Uh, we can safely have three packs a day for the next two months.” Beomgyu says, checking the pantry’s control panel. “Also, please don’t call me ‘Engineer boy’ ever again.”

“Okay, noted with thanks, Engineer _hoe_.” Ryujin takes a few cubes of minced onions and garlic and pops them in the steamer to reconstitute them. “Medic girl, can you find bowls for everyone?”

“Everyone _except_ our stupid, selfish captain?” Chaeryeong asks, already opening a drawer in the wall to rifle through their crockery.

Yeonjun frowns at her. _I thought us Earth people had to stick together, Chaeryeong._

“What’s our spice tolerance like, everyone?” Ryujin asks as she tosses the reconstituted onions and garlic into the pot with a little oil. “Except our stupid, selfish captain.”

“I can’t handle spice.” Beomgyu says.

“Me neither.” Taehyun agrees.

“Weak bitches, noted.” Ryujin looks in Chaeryeong’s direction. “What about you?”

“I like spicy.”

“Okay, so five scoops of this should be safe.” Ryujin says, tossing five heaping spatulas of chili paste into the pot. Taehyun and Beomgyu open their mouths to protest, but when Ryujin pours some water over it, the entire room is filled with a smell they can’t find any faults with.

Yeonjun scrunches up his nose. “Turn on the exhaust. All of our beds are going to smell-”

“Just sit there and eat your food, Captain.” Ryujin says, stirring her soup.

Chaeryeong switches the exhaust on. “Important question, who’s doing the dishes?”

“Not it!” Beomgyu screeches, touching his nose.

“Not it!” Ryujin and Taehyun follow suit.

“Not it!” Chaeryeong says, covering her entire nose with one hand.

Yeonjun stops chewing and looks up to find his crew staring at him. “What?”

“So nice of you to volunteer, Cappy.”

“I didn’t-” Yeonjun lowers his spoon adamantly. “New rule: Everyone cooks their own food and washes their own plates.”

Ryujin raises her spatula, flecking soup onto the common area’s floor. “I think this rule is dumb, who agrees?”

“Me.” Taehyun says.

“Me too.” Beomgyu adds.

“Sorry, Yeonjun.” Chaeryeong grimaces. “Let’s assign someone to cook and someone to wash up for every meal.”

“Great idea.” Ryujin points her spatula at Chaeryeong. “Why didn’t you go for the captain program. You should be captain. Who votes Chaeryeong to be our new captain, say aye!”

“Aye!”

“Aye!”

“Guys!” Chaeryeong laughs.

Yeonjun turns to her with a deep scowl. “This is mutiny.”

Beomgyu pats Yeonjun on the head. “Aw, poor baby. You can keep the badge, Cappy, it’s just that Chaeryeong’s in charge now.”

_Dear Mama and Papa:_

_My crew have mutinized against me. Is that a word? I don’t even know anymore. Being in this ship is making me stupid. It’s been less than two days and I already_

“Hey, Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun closes the draft of his email and spins to face Chaeryeong. “What is it?”

“We were just wondering when you’d come down for bed.”

Yeonjun frons. “ _We_?”

“We’re all worried about you.”

“Somehow I find that hard to believe.”

Chaeryeong laughs, leaning against the doorframe. “Ryujin and Beomgyu have a bet running that you’re an android who doesn’t need sleep.”

“ _That_ sounds more like them.” Yeonjun taps his fingers on his armrest.

“I told them you were one hundred percent human through and through, and that you definitely need the six hours like the rest of us.”

“We can’t all sleep at the same time. It’s more efficient if we take shifts and-”

“I know, I know.” Chaeryeong says gently. “But we’re _people._ We aren’t efficient by nature. We like eating together, working together, sleeping together – I mean, not like that, but kinda like that. You get me.”

Yeonjun sighs. “I wish I were an android.”

“I think we all do. But we’re not.” Chaeryeong lowers the lights in the bridge. “So as your medical officer, I am ordering you to sleep and go back to work tomorrow.”

“The medical officer can’t-”

“Jeez, Yeonjun, just go down before the others come up and tie you to your bed.”

Yeonjun signs out of his account and shuts down his terminal. He doesn’t know how badly he’s messed up in the past thirty hours for his crew to be giving _him_ orders now. _Maybe I_ do _deserve to be third rank._

Chaeryeong lies on her back, listening. She pulls her curtain back just a little bit. Yeonjun’s finally switched the lamp in his bed-shelf off.

She turns over and goes to sleep.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“This is nice.”

Chaeryeong blinks. She’s back home, on a grassy hillside in their dome.

But for some reason, her boyfriend’s lying on the grass next to her. _What…_

_Oh. This is a dream._

Chaeryeong smiles and lays down next to him, resting her head on his arm while he looks up at the calm blue light from the dome above.

“What’s that?” He asks.

Chaeryeong doesn’t look at whatever it is he’s pointing at. She’s had enough of these kinds of dreams to know better.

She tilts her chin up and plants a kiss on her boyfriend’s cheek.

“Ryeongchae, what… what the hell is that?” He keeps pointing up at something on the dome.

“It’s nothing, just ignore it, Jeongin.” Chaeryeong says, cupping his face with her hands. She’s only been away from him for less than two days and she already misses him. _How am I going to last two months?_

_And what if we get assigned to different ships after graduation?_

“W- What’s happening?”

The dome goes dark, as if Chaeryeong had shut her eyes. Then the warmth of Jeongin next to her fades to nothing, until her fingers and toes are cold and tingly.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Wake up, Captain.”

Chaeryeong swallows. Her heart is hammering around in her chest, like she’s just stopped running. She frowns at the face perched on the edge of her bed-shelf. “What?”

“You don’t remember? We voted you as captain yesterday.” Ryujin extends two hands to help Chaeryeong up. “Come on, Beomgyu’s just finished making breakfast.”

“Oh.” Chaeryeong rubs her eyes. She walks over to the kitchen sink to wash her face and hands.

The water is cold on her fingers, just like the darkness in her dream.

“Don’t leave the tap running.” Yeonjun grumbles behind her.

Chaeryeong jumps, switching the tap off in surprise. “Sorry.”

She walks back to the table to find Taehyun and Beomgyu arguing over their breakfast.

“It’s an omelette.” Beomgyu points at the yellowish lump on a plate in the middle of the table.

“That’s not an omelette, it’s just...” Taehyun makes a face at the lump. “ _Scattered eggs!_ ”

“You mean scrambled eggs?” Ryujin says.

“Yes!” Taehyun snaps his fingers. “Scrambled eggs!”

Beomgyu makes a face. “They’re the same thing!”

“No, they’re not! Why else would there be different names for them!”

“Boys.” Chaeryeong says sternly. “Sit down.”

Her crewmates lower their heads and scrape their chairs back dejectedly. Ryujin laughs as she cuts the yellow lump into four with a knife.

Chaeryeong looks up at Yeonjun, who’s currently ripping a cereal bar open. “There are five of us, Ryujin.”

“Not when it comes to food.” Ryujin says, dumping a quarter of Beomgyu’s egg creation onto Chaeryeong’s plate.

Chaeryeong frowns. “As captain, I order you to give Yeonjun some food.”

“Aw, come on, Chaeryeong, he doesn’t give a fuck about us,” Ryujin whines.

“Don’t make me ask again.” Chaeryeong warns.

“Fine, fine.” Ryujin gets up to find another plate and cuts her portion of the egg in half, dumping the other half onto the new plate. She holds it out to Yeonjun. “Here. Captain’s orders.”

“No thanks.” Yeonjun crumples the wrapper of his cereal bar. “Our morning meeting is in twenty minutes. I expect you all to be there, _on time_.”

He leaves the common area before anyone can say anything.

Ryujin lowers the plate slowly. “Goddammit one more plate to wash.”

“Uh…” Chaeryeong frowns at the charts on her screen.

“What is it?” Yeonjun frowns at her.

“You seem to be under a lot of stress.” Chaeryeong says, closing the screen.

“I could’ve told you that.”

Chaeryeong sighs. “You need to relax a little, Yeonjun.”

“How can I relax? I need to make sure the mission gets done and all of us get home safely.” Yeonjun says. “We’re several parsecs away from the nearest help-”

“I know.” Chaeryeong says, tapping the cross-shaped patch on her jacket sleeve. “Medical officer, remember?”

Yeonjun scowls at her. “I thought you were _captain_ now.” He grumbles.

“No, the others are just being stupid.” Chaeryeong gently unclips the heart and blood pressure monitor from Yeonjun’s arm, tucking it back into the case hanging from her belt.

“But they listen to you.”

Chaeryeong closes the case slowly, looking at Yeonjun. “I’m just bossy by nature, Yeonjun. Being a leader is different.”

“It’s impossible with those three.” Yeonjun leans back in his seat. He checks his watch. It’s an analog watch, like the one Chaeryeong’s grandfather has. “Where _are_ they? The meeting was supposed to start ten minutes ago.”

“Ryujin’s still washing plates, Taehyun’s in the bathroom, and Beomgyu’s waiting his turn.” Chaeryeong ticks them off on her fingers.

“I _told_ you this system was inefficient.”

“It’s a necessary evil.”

“It’s the source of my stress.”

Chaeryeong laughs. “I’ll do the others’ check-ups after the meeting.”

“Thank you, Chaeryeong.”

Chaeryeong had been on her way to her station, but she stops in midstep. _Yeonjun sounded almost…_ _nice_. She shrugs. It’s weird, but not unwelcome.

“…and last night we did karaoke,” Jeongin says, his face a giddy set of pixels on Chaeryeong’s screen. “I got the highest score, of course.”

“Of course.” Chaeryeong laughs. She rests the screen on her knees as she hugs them. She understands that his ship is in a totally different star system of the same cluster – at least they’re close enough for the occasional video call like this – but that doesn’t mean she has to _like_ it. “You were in my dream again the other night.”

“Really? What _kind_ of dream was it? Was I naked? Were _you_ -”

“Shut up, you greaseball.” Chaeryeong laughs, flicking the camera with one finger.

Jeongin stops laughing and pouts at the screen. “I miss you so much.”

“It’s been _two_ days, Jeongin.”

“I know.”

Chaeryeong rests a hand on the screen, the hologram turning fuzzy where her finger touches the image of his face.

“What’re you thinking about?” Jeongin asks.

“I’m worried about our captain.”

“Why?” The pixels of Jeongin’s face arrange themselves into a frown. “What’s happening to him?”

“The others don’t like him.”

“Your captain’s Choi Yeonjun, right?”

“Yes.” Chaeryeong says.

“Our captain was his roommate for four years, but he doesn’t really know much about him. I guess he’s not that friendly.”

Chaeryeong frowns. “Why were you even talking about him?”

“Dunno, he just came up while we were talking over dinner.”

“So you have dinner together?”

Jeongin laughs. “Yes, obviously. Why, you don’t?”

“We do.” Chaeryeong says. She looks at Jeongin’s face as he carries on talking about the games he and their engineer were playing, but she can’t forget the way he looked right before the darkness took over. _In your dream. It was just a dream. It wasn’t real._

“Ryeongchae?”

“Huh?” Chaeryeong blinks. “Oh, sorry. I spaced.”

“Good, I thought our connection was going.”

“Yeah, about that,” Chaeryeong says. “We’re arriving at our planet in four days, so I won’t be able to call. We’ll be using all our bandwidth to send data back to the Academy.”

“ _Four days_? Lucky.” Jeongin scrunches his nose up. “Ours is still five days away.”

Chaeryeong lifts a hand and touches his hologram again. “I’ll try to call when I can.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Chaeryeong blinks when she finds herself sitting on one of the rolling hills of their dome.

“What’re you thinking about, beautiful?” Jeongin asks.

She stares at him for a moment. _What’s Jeongin doing here?_

_Oh. This is a dream._

Chaeryeong rolls over and pins Jeongin down in the grass, kissing him.

“Wuh- Wait, Ryeongchae! There’s something-”

The darkness cuts him off, drowning them both in a cold, silent, _nothing_.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Engineering, report.”

Chaeryeong yawns. Then she realizes Yeonjun’s looking her way and covers her mouth quickly.

Beomgyu spins around aimlessly in his chair. “Oh, we’re good, Cappy.”

“Engineering. _Report_.” Yeonjun says, more forcefully this time.

Beomgyu sighs. “The engine is fine. The thrusters are fine. Ryujin and I tried out the brakes a while ago, and guess what? They’re fine.”

Yeonjun rubs his temples. “What about the solar panels and emergency fuel-”

“Fine! They’re all fine!” Beomgyu says, throwing his hands in the air. “They would set off the alarm if they weren’t, and have you heard any alarms lately?”

“No.” Taehyun replies.

“That’s right, because everything is _fine_.” Beomgyu sighs.

Ryujin raises a boot.

Yeonjun frowns at her.

“I think two meetings a day is too fucking much.” Ryujin says, lowering her foot. “The ship basically drives itself, and we’d definitely let you know if something’s up.”

“We monitor everything closely so we can _prevent_ things from going wrong.” Yeonjun says. “You don’t administer vaccines when someone’s already sick.”

Taehyun blinks. “What? You _don’t_?”

“No, Taehyun, that wouldn’t… work.” Chaeryeong sighs. She turns to Yeonjun. “I also think we have too many meetings.”

“But-”

“We need to be doing more exercise.” Chaeryeong says. “We can’t let our muscles atrophy. The planet we’re landing on might have stronger gravity than the artificial one we’ve got here.”

Ryujin leans back in her seat with a triumphant grin on her face and Taehyun shrugs in agreement. Beomgyu just keeps spinning in his chair.

Yeonjun wets his lips. “Fine. I’ll replace the morning meeting with an hour of maintenance drills.”

“ _Morning_?” Ryujin frowns.

“After breakfast?” Taehyun frowns.

“We shouldn’t be exerting ourselves right after breakfast.” Beomgyu says. “We could get cramps.”

Ryujin frowns at him. “ _Dudes_ get cramps, too?”

Chaeryeong raises her hand.

“Yes?” Yeonjun asks irritably.

“Let’s have breakfast at 0600, then morning exercise at 0700 to give us enough time to digest.” Chaereyong says, scribbling out a schedule on her screen using one finger. “Start our daily rounds at 0815, then break for lunch at 1200. We can have some free time until 1300, then go back to work until 1800, where we can have the meeting. Uh, dinner is at 1900, then we’ll do the night rounds at 2000, but everyone should be in bed by 2330.”

She projects the schedule onto the ship’s windshield screen.

Yeonjun studies it for a moment. He stares at it so intensely that it’s as if Chaeryeong can _see_ the machinery in his head working.

“Fine.”

Ryujin puts her boots up on her dashboard. “That’s _my_ captain.”

“Aye.” Beomgyu agrees.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Ryeongchae, what’s-”

“Ignore it.”

“B- But it’s-!”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Chaeryeong jolts awake, like she’d fallen into her bed. _Why is this happening every night now?_

She pulls back her curtain. All the other lamps are off and the curtains are drawn shut. _Good._ She walks to the kitchen area to get herself a glass of water. She doesn’t switch the lights on, and just finds her away around with the ambient dim lights along the edges of the cabin.

The door to the common area slides open, and Chaeryeong nearly drops her glass. “Holy fucking- _Taehyun_?”

Taehyun yawns, rubbing his eyes. “Oh, hey, Chaeryeong.”

Chaeryeong frowns at him. “Where did you come from?”

“I’ve been checking our comms systems.” Taehyun bumps into the table in the middle of the room then stops and frowns at it, like he’s surprised it’s there.

Chaeryeong looks at the clock on the wall. “Can’t that wait till morning?”

“Something’s interfering with…everything.” Taehyun yawns.

“Oh. We’re pretty near the planet now,” Chaeryeong says. “Maybe it has a strong EM field.”

“No, that would make extra… noise.” Taehyun wiggles his fingers to illustrate it. “What we’re getting is not noise.”

Chaeryeong takes a sip of water. “Then what is it?”

“Quiet.” Taehyun says. “It’s too quiet.”

Chaeryeong frowns at him.

“Well, anyway, I need some sleep, see you in the morning.” Taehyun tries to salute her, but he pokes himself in the eye. “Fuck.”

“Good night, Taehyun.” Chaeryeong says gently.

“Good night.”


	5. The Milk

Ryujin narrows her eyes at Yeonjun for a while.

Then she drops a fried sausage into his bowl. “Here. Just because we’re landing today.”

“Thanks.” Yeonjun says, taking his seat at the table. He reaches out and takes the pitcher of milk away from Chaeryeong. “Are you okay?”

“Huh?” Chaeryeong looks at the puddle of milk on the table that’s overflowed from her coffee mug. “Sorry. I didn’t get any sleep last night.”

“Tell Jeongin to give you a break,” Beomgyu laughs. “We need a functional medical officer.”

Chaeryeong frowns at him. “I wasn’t-”

“None of us can make any calls.” Taehyun says, missing his mouth with his spoon. “Fuck.”

Yeonjun stops methodically dicing his sausage into cubes. “What do you mean?”

“The comms system is down.” Taehyun says. “We can send out stuff, but we’ll never know if anyone’s getting them.”

Yeonjun puts his knife down. “Then how are we going to send our data from the new planet back to the Academy?”

“Can you fix it?” Ryujin asks.

“No, the comms system is perfectly fine.” Taehyun says.

“You just _said_ it was down.” Beomgyu frowns.

“It’s working fine, but it’s like…” Taehyun dips a finger into the puddle of milk around Chaeryeong’s mug. “We are here. In the milk. Everything is quiet in the milk.”

He slides his finger out to another part of the table. “Once we get out of the milk, I think we’ll be fine again.”

Yeonjun narrows his eyes. “Are you drunk?”

“Son of a bitch, Taehyun, you smuggled alcohol on here and _didn’t fucking share it_?” Ryujin smacks the table.

“Rudeass motherfucker.” Beomgyu clicks his tongue disapprovingly.

“I’m not drunk!” Taehyun says. “It’s true! Something’s blocking all of our comms, and it just started when we closed in on the planet!”

Chaeryeong fingers tingle, like they can remember the cold, dark nothingness from her dreams. “Are we sure we still want to go?”

“It’s our mission.” Yeonjun says. “And the Academy deemed it safe enough for undergraduates-”

“But they never said anything about a dead comms zone.” Beomgyu says. “I vote we stay the fuck away from this planet.”

“I second the motion.” Chaeryeong says.

“I say we just fucking go for it.” Ryujin says.

“I agree.” Taehyun says. “If there’s something out there, something even the Academy didn’t anticipate, I want to know what it is. We might never get a chance like this in our entire lives-”

“Assuming we don’t lose said lives in the middle of fucking nowhere.” Beomgyu says.

Chaeryeong’s started mopping up the milk on the table. “I’m sure they’ll understand if we just turn around because it wasn’t safe-”

“The whole point of being an explorer _is_ that it isn’t safe. We all knew that when we signed up.” Ryujin says. She kicks the leg of Yeonjun’s chair. “So, Captain, what do you think?”

Yeonjun stares at her for a minute. “W- What did you call me?”

“Captain. What do you want? _Your Majesty? Your Excellence?_ ” Ryujin scoffs. She kicks his chair again. “We’re half and half. You’re the tiebreaker. What do you say?”

Yeonjun watches Chaeryeong dab at the table with a rag. “I’d like to see your data on this dead zone, Taehyun.”

Ryujin rolls her eyes. “Here I was thinking you’d actually make a damn decision-”

“I will.” Yeonjun says. “But I want to make a decision based on facts. Taehyun, let’s go.”

Beomgyu hears the door to the engine room slide open. “If you’re here to ask me to be more polite or some shit, I don’t give a fuck. I said what I said.”

When Yeonjun doesn’t reply, Beomgyu clambers out of the engine’s crawlspace. “Chaeryeong?”

“I think Yeonjun wants to push through with the mission.” Chaeryeong says quietly.

“Of course he does. He loves following the Academy’s orders and shit.” Beomgyu wipes his hands off on a rag he’d hung from a rack on the wall. “I’ve already prepped everything for landing.”

Chaeryeong frowns. “You’re okay with it?”

“No, but things are going to be a hell of a lot worse if everyone goes with it except me.” Beomgyu wipes his forehead with the rag.

“I’m not ready to die yet, Beomgyu.”

“Whew, I guess we’re having this conversation at eight in the morning. Okay, let’s go!” Beomgyu pulls two chairs out of a compartment in the wall and hands one to Chaeryeong. “You don’t mind the heat in here, do you?”

“I like it. It’s too cold upstairs.” Chaeryeong says.

“You can complain about that.” Beomgyu says. “Yeonjun will turn the a/c all the way down if you just say the word.”

Chaeryeong sinks into her chair, burying her face in her hands.

“How’s your boyfriend doing?”

Chaeryeong just shakes her head, her face still in her hands.

“I’m going to come clean,” Beomgyu says, scooting his chair closer to hers. “Jeongin and I uh, _danced_ together at this party last year. There was a _teeny tiny_ little bit of making out involved.”

Chaeryeong lifts one hand and smacks him on the arm, _hard_. “Stop joking around-”

“He’s a great kisser, for someone with retainers.”

Chaeryeong looks up at Beomgyu with a very deep pout. “You _didn’t_.”

“I did, and I know you two weren’t dating yet at that time, but anyway, I’m sorry.” Beomgyu clasps his hands together as if in prayer. “Just had to get that off my chest.”

Chaeryeong slaps him on the arm again.

“Wasn’t one time enough?” Beomgyu rubs his arm.

“I thought I was his first kiss.” Chaeryeong mutters.

“Well, uh, sorry, but no, you’re not.” Beomgyu says. “If it’s any consolation, I don’t think I was, either.”

“How is that supposed to _console_ me?”

“No idea, but we’re not talking about death anymore, right?” Beomgyu gives her an uneasy smile. “Crap.”

Chaeryeong takes a deep breath of the stale, warm engine room air. “I’m not going to blame anybody if we _do_ die, but I just… I’m not ready for it.”

“I don’t think many 20-year-olds are prepared for death, Chaeryeong.” Beomgyu pats her on the shoulder. “I know _I’m_ not.”

“Yeah, but like, look at Taehyun-”

“He’s a literal space case.”

“What about Ryujin!”

“She’s just pretending not to care.” Beomgyu pats both of Chaeryeong’s shoulders. “Nobody in this ship wants to die, not even our android captain.”

“He’s human.”

“Not mentally he isn’t.”

Chaeryeong sighs. She looks up at Beomgyu with a little smile. “Can I have a hug?”

Beomgyu leans away with a wary frown. “Why?”

“You look like you give good hugs.”

Beomgyu laughs and opens his arms, patting Chaeryeong on the back when she goes in for a hug. “I give good _everything_ , Chaeryeong. Just ask your boyfriend.”

Chaeryeong punches Beomgyu in the face.

“Ow what the _fuck_!” Beomgyu says, making a face as he rubs his mouth.

“I thought you said you _just_ made out!” Chaeryeong yells over the purr of the engine.

Beomgyu screws up his face as he spits out some blood onto the floor. “I was _joking,_ Chae-”

Chaeryeong collapses to the floor.

“Shit.”

“What did you _do_?” Ryujin’s already raised a fist at Beomgyu.

Beomgyu ducks behind Yeonjun. “We were just joking around!”

“Now’s not the time for that shit.” Yeonjun says, shrugging Beomgyu’s hand off his shoulder. He opens the case at Chaeryeong’s waist and clips the monitor around her wrist. Her pulse and blood pressure come up on a tiny hologram screen from the device. “Well, she seems to be fine.”

“Considering her history of motion sickness,” Taehyun says, scanning through Chaeryeong’s record in the ship’s database. “It’s probably better she’s unconscious for landing.”

“She has _what_?” Ryujin makes a face. “And she still signed up for the Fleet?”

“Wait, we’re pushing through with the landing?” Beomgyu frowns.

“Yes.” Yeonjun says, the flat kind of yes that even Beomgyu doesn’t have the heart to argue with.

“Chaeryeong didn’t want to.”

“We’re working on orders higher than all of us.” Yeonjun says. He kneels down and picks Chaeryeong up off the floor of the bridge. “Ryujin, walk Beomgyu through our chosen landing protocol.”

Beomgyu turns to Ryujin. “No.”

Ryujin shrugs. “I could probably do it without you, anyway.”

Beomgyu heaves a sigh. “I doubt that. Tell me.”

Yeonjun eases Chaeryeong into her seat, gently clipping her seatbelt on. “Sorry.” He says quietly.

He turns back to the other three. “Everyone, to your stations. We’ll start the landing protocol in five minutes.”

_“We don’t know what’s under the tree cover there.”_

Chaeryeong’s head is spinning as she comes to, slowly, but very, painfully, surely.

_“I think it’s safer to land on the sandbar and keep the ship elevated by a few meters, to account for tidal changes.”_

Chaeryeong can’t open her eyes yet. She can _hear_ the blood rushing to her head, like she’s doing a handstand.

_“What’s happening? Beomgyu, what’s happening?”_

Chaeryeong scrunches her eyebrows together.

_“I- I don’t know, Cap- The engine’s down.”_

Chaeryeong opens her eyes to find the bridge bathed in red light. Alarms blare right into her sensitive ears. She raises both hands to cover them, but it’s all too loud.

Her stomach feels funny. And her hair is standing up.

_Oh._

Chaeryeong realizes the ship is in freefall.

“What do you _mean_ down?” Yeonjun shouts from somewhere behind Chaeryeong.

“It’s… off? It’s completely cooled down, like we shut it down a hour ago!” Beomgyu shouts back.

“Can you get it back on?”

“I’ll try!” Beomgyu unclips his seatbelt and stumbles out of the bridge. Chaeryeong reaches out to stop him, but she’s too slow.

“Ryujin-”

“I’m trying to spiral us down!” Ryujin’s using both hands to steer the ship to the right. “But we started too late! I don’t think-”

“Just try!” Yeonjun shouts. “Taehyun! Update!”

“15 kilometers to impact-”

“ _IMPACT_!” Ryujin yells at him. “WHY IMPACT?”

“14 kilometers to impact!”

“STOP SAYING IMPACT!”

“Just focus on your own job, Ryujin! Taehyun, update!”

“11 kilometers to impact!”

“MOTHERFUCKER!”

“6 kilometers to impact!”

Chaeryeong shuts her eyes again, gripping the armrests of her seat. _I’m so sorry, Mom, and Dad, and my sisters, and Jeongin, and-_

“1 kilometer to-”

A bright, milky light fills the cabin.

Taehyun had thought about death before, many times. He’d wondered whether it was darkness or light that consumed you, or if you heard a very loud sound or nothing at all. The only thing he feared about his own death is that he wouldn’t be able to write down what happens afterwards.

Everything goes bright, then very dark.

It’s all loud, then everything goes away.

_How annoying,_ Taehyun thinks. _Death couldn’t even make up its mind._

Taehyun unclips his seatbelt, and falls out of his chair and onto some hard surface.

_Wait a second._

He struggles to get to his feet in the pitch darkness.

_Damn. I guess I’m not dead._

“Captain?” Taehyun calls out. “Ryujin?”

“…better not fucking talk about fucking impact…”

“Ryujin?” Taehyun waves his arms around in front of him. “Ryujin, where are you?”

“…fucking ship’s fucking engine…”

“Shin Ryujin!” Taehyun shouts. “Ryujin!”

“Goddammit, Taehyun, shut up! I can hear you!”

“Ryujin! Where are you?”

“Could you both _please_ shut up. My head is _pounding_.”

“Captain!” Taehyun reaches out in the darkness. “Where are you?”

“The ship is on its side.” Yeonjun’s voice says. Taehyun hears the click of a seatbelt followed by the thud of a body nearby.

“Captain?”

Something brushes against Taehyun’s outstretched hand. “I’m here, please shut up.”

Taehyun hears another click, followed by a much louder thud, and a crack.

“Ouch motherFUCK!”

“I said the ship was on its’ side, genius!” Yeonjun snaps in the general direction of their moaning crewmate.

“You didn’t say which fucking side!” Ryujin groans. “I think I broke my fucking leg.”

“Chaeryeong?” Yeonjun calls out. “Chaeryeong?”

Taehyun can only hear his heart beating in his hears, Yeonjun’s heavy breathing, and Ryujin’s muttered curses.

_Oh no._

“CHAERYEONG!” Yeonjun shouts. “LEE CHAERYEONG!”

“I’m awake, I’m awake.” Chaeryeong’s voice is small and distant. “But I think I’m stuck.”

The other three let out one huge sigh of relief.

“Stay there, we’ll come and get you.” Yeonjun shouts. “If the ship had fallen the way I think it did, it’s a long drop from there to here.”

“How come you warned her and not me?” Ryujin yells.

“Would you have listened if I warned you?”

“I- Maybe!” Ryujin groans again. “My fucking leg!”

Taehyun grabs Yeonjun’s arm. “Beomgyu.”

The cabin’s emergency lights come to life at that moment, lighting up all of their confused faces with a gentle, purplish glow.

“What the-”

The ship lets out a loud groan and a creak, before the room turns itself upright. Yeonjun manages to catch Ryujin in his arms, holding her leg steady as the room turns.

But you wouldn’t know that from the noise she was making.

“MOTHERFUCKING OW WHAT THE FUCK-”

“Shh,” Yeonjun clamps a hand over his mouth. He frowns up at Taehyun in the dim light. “What was that?”

“Beomgyu.”

The door to the bridge slides open, revealing a figure in the doorway bathed in a halo of white light.

Ryujin sits up. “Beomgyu!”

Beomgyu trudges into the bridge. “Engine’s back up, Captain. We’re hovering two meters over land.”

“ _Land_?” Yeonjun lowers Ryujin gently onto the floor to catch Beomgyu before he falls over. “H- How the hell did you do it?”

Beomgyu lets Yeonjun support him with one shoulder, but frowns at him anyway. “Uh, _hello_? I _am_ ranked third out of two hundred engineers in the Academy for a _reason_.”

“I thought that was because you’re good at giving head.” Ryujin shouts from her corner of the floor.

“He’s good at giving _everything_!” Chaeryeong drawls from her seat in the other side of the room.

Beomgyu grins. “Yeah damn right I am.”

Yeonjun hits the record button. “Incident report. Internal time on the _EXP Charlie_ is 1600, 143 hours from launch. 30 minutes into protocol landing over shallow water, the engine suddenly shut off. We are still looking into the reasons behind-”

“Just say we don’t know.” Ryujin groans.

Yeonjun clears his throat. “At the time of creating this report, we do not know what caused the engine to turn off and cool down so rapidly. It is fortunate that our engineer, Choi Beomgyu, was able to manually restart the engine. Would you like to elaborate, Beomgyu?”

“I put my fucking _back_ into it.”

Yeonjun makes a face. “Ah, as I was saying, our engineer was able to restart the engine before impact. He will create his own _detailed_ report on that in the future. The ship’s autopilot then took over and allowed us to achieve a relatively safe landing on Novel Planet 102695, also known as Cormby-24-D. We are not yet aware of the extent of damage sustained by the ship, but all five of the ship’s crew are accounted for.”

“Ryujin’s leg.” Taehyun adds helpfully.

“Oh, right.” Yeonjun says. “Unfortunately, our pilot’s right leg has been injured, but it does not seem to be life-threatening-”

“FUCK YOU IT HURTS!” Ryujin shouts.

“-As the said pilot is still alive and kicking. With her other leg.” Yeonjun grins at his little joke. “End incident report.”

“You’re the worst.” Ryujin mutters.

“Wait, I think I’m ready to look at Ryujin’s leg now.” Chaeryeong says, walking over from her side of the bridge.

Beomgyu looks alarmed, but too tired to get up. “Stop!”

Taehyun jumps in and covers Chaeryeong’s eyes. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

Chaeryeong stops in her tracks. “Oh. Is it _that_ bad?”

“Uh, it’s like this,” Ryujin pokes her leg, which makes a sickening squelch.

Chaeryeong stumbles backward a few steps, eyes still shut. “Oh my god I _smell_ it-”

“Chaeryeong-” Yeonjun reaches out to catch her.

Chaeryeong stumbles right into Yeonjun’s arms.

Then she vomits right down the front of his crisp white uniform.

Ryujin sputters into laughter. “Holy shit, _please_ tell me we have that on video.”

Taehyun is horrified. “Sadly, yes. We do.”

“I’m sorry for throwing up on you, Captain.”

Yeonjun had been sipping tea with one hand and scrolling down something on his tablet with the other. His hair’s still damp from a shower, and his uniform is a gleaming white from the laundry machine. He stops and looks up at Chaeryeong. “No, it’s fine. How are you feeling?”

“Still pretty bad.” Chaeryeong looks back at Ryujin’s bed-shelf. “But we definitely need to set Ryujin’s leg by tomorrow.”

“We’ll get it done in the morning. I’ve already disinfected it.” Yeonjun says, going back to his tea. “You should get some rest.”

Chaeryeong pulls out the chair opposite his and sits down. “No, I think I’m on too much adrenaline to sleep. Besides, you’re not sleeping either.”

“I’m fine.” Yeonjun puts the tablet down and rubs his eyes. Then he notices Chaeryeong’s concerned frown. “Fine, I’ll just finish this cup then I’ll go to sleep.”

“What’re you reading?”

“The initial readings on this planet.” Yeonjun turns the tablet to Chaeryeong.

Chaeryeong scans down the first page of the report from the ship’s external sensors. “Huh.”

“Strange, right?” Yeonjun says. “A ton more ppms of particulates in the air, a few degrees warmer, and it would be just like home.”

“Are you sure the sensors didn’t get messed up when we crashed?”

“No.” Yeonjun switches the tablet off. “We’ll have to go out and see for ourselves tomorrow.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> press F for Ryujin's leg


	6. Breathable

“You are a strong, beautiful, confident woman.” Beomgyu says, squishing Chaeryeong’s face between his hands. “You can do this.”

“I am a strong, beautiful, confident woman?” Chaeryeong echoes, sounding much less sure of it. “I can do this?”

“Beomgyu, give her space.” Yeonjun says. He looks down at Ryujin, whom they’ve laid out on the dining table (with several layers of absorbent and waterproof sheeting underneath, of course). “Are you ready?”

“Fuck me, dude, is the _medic_ ready?” Ryujin says, staring at Chaeryeong with her eyes wide.

“I think it would be best if you kept quiet for the entire procedure.” Taehyun says, patting Ryujin on the hand. He looks at Yeonjun. “Should we gag her?”

Yeonjun frowns back. “No, I… No. Absolutely not.”

“You are a strong! Beautiful! Confident! Woman!” Beomgyu says, shaking Chaeryeong’s head.

“I’m uh… I’m a woman?”

“YOU CAN DO THIS!”

“I DON’T WANNA DO THIS!”

Yeonjun sighs. “Chaeryeong, do it now. Ryujin’s in pain.”

“Yeah damn right I am!”

Chaeryeong takes a deep breath and turns to face the table, though her eyes are still screwed shut. She reaches out with one hand.

Beomgyu holds her hand. “Okay, take it easy, easy does it,”

Chaeryeong lets her eyes flutter open slowly. Then she looks down at Ryujin, who’s stripped down to her tank top and cycling shorts. Chaeryeong’s expression is almost serene as she looks at Ryujin’s milky white bone peeking out of a gash in her leg.

“Well would you look at that.” Chaeryeong says with a small smile. “Hello, bone.”

Beomgyu tightens his grip on her hand. “Are you okay?”

“Never been better.” Chaeryeong says, before fainting clean away.

“I just don’t understand!” Ryujin whines, wriggling on the table. “She owns a uterus! She sees blood every damn month!”

“Shut up, Ryujin.” Yeonjun says, nodding to Taehyun.

Taehyun calmly ties a dishrag around the girl’s mouth.

“Are you ready?” Yeonjun turns Chaeryeong. But she’s turned away from the table and holding a handkerchief with perfume over her nose and mouth.

“Yes.” Chaeryeong nods. “Beomgyu?”

“Yup.” Beomgyu lifts a small chest with a big red cross on it onto the table. He opens it and takes out a pair of latex gloves, snapping them on. He’s spraying his gloved hands down with disinfectant as he says, “Let’s start.”

Ryujin’s still trying to say something through the dishcloth, but Taehyun’s holding her down by the shoulders.

“Okay.” Yeonjun says, holding Ryujin’s feet down. “Whenever you’re ready, Chaeryeong.”

Chaeryeong takes a deep breath through the perfumed handkerchief.

“Beomgyu, there’s a green spray bottle there that says _Posetidone_ on the label.” Chaeryeong says. “Got it?”

“Yeah. What do I do?”

“Spray it all over the wound. Like, _all_ over.”

Beomgyu starts spraying, which sets Ryujin off, wriggling more than ever. “Does this thing _hurt_?”

“No, that’s just the first anesthetic.” Chaeryeong says.

Beomgyu heaves a sigh. “This is going to be a long morning.”

“How is our patient doing?” Yeonjun asks.

“Really well, actually.” Chaeryeong’s pulled up a chair next to Ryujin’s bed-shelf, where she’s lying fast asleep. “She looks almost peaceful like this.”

“Looks can be deceiving.” Yeonjun says. “We’re going out to survey the ship’s exterior and the area around us.”

Chaeryeong stands up. “Who’s going? I want to go.”

“Don’t you have to look after Ryujin?”

“She’s a big girl, she’ll be fine.” Chaeryeong says. She taps the display on her wristwatch. “Besides, I’ll get an alert if anything happens to her.”

“And if you’re too far away to get back quickly?” Yeonjun shakes her head. “No. You stay here with Ryujin for the meantime. You can come out when she’s more stable.”

“Fine.” Chaeryeong crosses her arms. “Can you at least share a live feed or are the comms really toast?”

“Our internal comms system should be able to handle it.” Yeonjun says. “I’ll ask Taehyun.”

“Thanks, Captain.”

Ryujin sits up. “The fuck are you watching?”

“Oh, hey, how are you feeling?” Chaeryeong asks, looking away from her tablet.

“Fine.” Ryujin bends over and lifts her blanket. The gash on her leg is being held closed with a neon, minty green substance. “Is this glue?”

“Beomgyu’s idea.”

“Am I a cyborg now?”

“No.” Chaeryeong says firmly.

“Dammit.” Ryujin leans back against her pillow. “Where _is_ my slutty surgeon?”

“Beomgyu? He and the others are outside.”

Ryujin’s eyebrows shoot up. Then she sinks against her pillows with a loud groan. “I can’t believe I’ve got to sit out our first actual foreign planet walk.”

“Well, I’m stuck here with you.” Chaeryeong grumbles. “If that makes it any better.”

“Captain’s orders?” Ryujin asks.

“Yeah.”

“Ugh. Men.” Ryujin rolls her eyes. Then she cranes her neck to look at Chaeryeong’s tablet. “What’re they up to?”

The planet’s star is setting low over the horizon when Taehyun steps out. The sky has turned a deep orange color, painting the trees around him a bright red. They’re tall and skinny trees, with big, broad leaves that droop down from their tops.

The ground around him is made of pinkish sand, which is making it hard to walk around in his heavy exosuit, because his boots keep sinking into the sand.

“You okay, Taehyun?” Yeonjun calls back over the comms. He’s almost a hundred meters ahead.

_Show-off_ , Taehyun grumbles, dragging his heavy boots through the sand. “Fine.”

“How’s the ship looking, Beomgyu?”

“The surface is pretty beat-up, but the self-healing exoskeleton is doing its’ job.” Beomgyu says.

Taehyun looks back. Beomgyu’s a tiny, toy-sized figure climbing their little ship in the distance.

“How long until the casing has sealed over?” Yeonjun asks.

“Uh…” Beomgyu’s breath crackles to static over the comms.

“How long?” Taehyun asks.

“Two weeks, tops.” Beomgyu says.

“ _Two_ weeks?” Yeonjun coughs into the comms.

“That’s the best-case scenario. This planet seems a bit warm for the bacteria’s taste.” Beomgyu says. “The bacteria that are regenerating the ship’s exoskeleton-”

“I know how it works, Beomgyu, thanks.” Yeonjun snaps back. Then his line beeps softly as he turns his comms off.

Taehyun watches Yeonjun’s figure thrash around in the distance and kick up some sand. He thinks he can even hear a little bit of yelling from this far away.

_He has some real problems_. Taehyun shrugs. He checks the ship’s readings on the planet against the ones from his own exosuit.

He lifts both eyebrows. That’s weird.

Taehyun reaches up and starts unclasping his helmet.

“Taehyun?” Yeonjun’s voice comes back over the comms. Taehyun sees him turn his way in the distance. “Taehyun, what are you doing?”

“The air here is…” Taehyun undoes the third to the last latch.

“Taehyun! Stop!” Yeonjun yells, breaking into a run. “Don’t-”

Taehyun pulls his helmet off with a light push.

“TAEHYUN!”

“No! What the fuck!” Ryujin yells. “Call them or something! CAPTAIN!”

“TAEHYUN, DON’T DO IT!” Chaeryeong screams, shaking her tablet. “NO!”

They watch as Taehyun takes his helmet off in the middle of the beach. Actually, Ryujin watches. Chaeryeong has squeezed her eyes shut.

“W- What happened? Is he o- okay?” She asks in a shaky voice.

“Holy crap.” Ryujin breathes.

Chaeryeong slaps her on the arm. “Is he okay!?”

“Yes, woman, _gosh_ , I’m already injured,” Ryujin says, rubbing her arm.

“Sorry.”

“Put your helmet back on.” Yeonjun says. “Now.”

“The air is great, Captain. A little salty, but that might be from the water.” Taehyun looks at the ocean, which is darkening to black as the starlight fades around them.

“It’s getting dark, Cappy, I’m going back in.” Beomgyu’s voice comes over the comms. “Bring that crackhead in with you.”

“I will.” Yeonjun bends over to pick up Taehyun’s helmet, brushing the sand off.

“You should try this,” Taehyun takes in a huge gulp of air. “My lungs have never felt better.”

“Stop that.” Yeonjun places Taehyun’s helmet back onto his head, but Taehyun won’t let him clasp it sealed. “Don’t be stubborn. I’m going to kill you if you die.”

“Real cute and sweet, Cappy, but you guys should probably come in like, right now.”

“I know, I-” Yeonjun pauses and looks at the ocean. The waves have started to glow a bright aquamarine color right where they crest. “That’s not normal.”

“It’s beautiful.” Taehyun says.

“No, it’s strange and you are _not_ inhaling any more of it.” Yeonjun bends over and scoops Taehyun up in his arms, loose helmet and all.

“Wait, I wanna watch the glowing water-”

“Chaeryeong? Can you hear me?” Yeonjun says, running down the beach with Taehyun in a fireman’s carry. “Get the oxygen mask. I think Taehyun’s been poisoned.”

“Can we at least get a video of it?” Taehyun asks.

Yeonjun frowns at him. “No.”

Yeonjun wakes up with the sun on his face. _Am I home?_

He isn’t. He’s sitting at the table in their ship’s common area, where he’s been the whole night, until the light streaming in through the window woke him up.

Yeonjun frowns as he walks up to the window. The window filters out any harmful radiation, but he feels the warmth on his skin, and it feels so familiar it makes his chest ache.

He turns back to find all of the bed-shelves empty, even Ryujin’s.

Yeonjun rushes up to the bridge.

It’s also empty.

He checks the engine room. Also empty.

He checks the closet of exosuits. All five are accounted for, gleaming bright orange like they haven’t been touched.

_Where is everyone?_

“Captain? Hey, Captain? Is that you? Are you awake?”

Yeonjun frowns. “Yes, it’s me, Chaeryeong, where are you?”

“Come out, the weather’s amazing!”

Yeonjun freezes on the spot. “Excuse me?”

Yeonjun waddles out in his exosuit, squinting in the bright starlight.

The trees all look like palm trees, but their leaves are purple instead of green, rising into a dense purple forest deeper into the island. The sand is a bright, rosy pink that fades into the deep indigo ocean. But other than the colors, everything looks and feels like a place he’d gone to on Earth once.

He notices some figures further down the beach, waving at him.

He realizes it’s his crewmates, but they seem to have dumped all their uniforms in a pile on the sand, running around in nothing but their tank tops and cycling shorts. Well, all of them are running except Ryujin, who’s sitting by their discarded uniforms, building a mound of the light pink sand. Chaeryeong seems to be teaching Taehyun how to cartwheel, while Beomgyu pokes around at something in the water, himself knee-deep in the waves.

Yeonjun’s heart starts racing. He also starts running. “STOP! WHAT ARE ALL OF YOU DOING?”

Taehyun laughs. “Relax, Captain. The conditions on this planet are close enough to Earth’s-”

“But also _way_ better.” Chaeryeong says. “You don’t even need a dome to filter the air!”

Yeonjun shakes his head.

Something tugs on one leg of his exosuit.

He looks down at Ryujin.

“Don’t you trust us?” She asks.

Yeonjun doesn’t want to say no. But he also doesn’t want to lie.

“Trust _me_ , I’m the medical officer, and I say this planet is perfectly safe.” Chaeryeong says, crossing her heart with one hand. “Even the UV rays are being filtered out by the atmosphere. Isn’t that amazing?”

Yeonjun sighs. He would be a terrible captain if he were to be the only one who came back alive.

He unclasps his helmet and shuts his eyes as he takes it off.

The waves crash right then, showering him with a salty spray.

Yeonjun scrunches his face up, blinking the salt water out of his eyes.

Then he opens them. Without the helmet’s tinted glass, the colors are all much cooler and brighter. Yeonjun smiles. He’s never seen anything like this.

_Actually, I have._

_Once._

“Fish!” Beomgyu starts splashing around in the water. “I found a fish!”

Yeonjun frowns at him. “A _living_ fish?”

“Yeah! Wait, I’ll try to catch it.” Beomgyu says.

“No! Don’t catch it!” Taehyun protests. “We can’t mess with the aliens’ way of life.”

Beomgyu crosses his arms. “It’s a fucking _fish_ , Taehyun.”

“Don’t catch it anyway.” Yeonjun says. “Get out of the water, Beomgyu.”

Beomgyu smirks at him. “ _Make_ me.”

Yeonjun sighs, turning to Chaeryeong for help, but she’s already started cartwheeling away.

“10 out of 10!” Ryujin shouts at her, laughing.

Yeonjun makes a decision. It’s a dumb decision, but it’s not going to be the first dumb decision of the day. _Might as well be consistent._

He sheds his exosuit and tosses it into the pile next to Ryujin.

“Take it _all_ off, Captain!” Ryujin snorts, with a less-than-friendly whistle.

Yeonjun calmly flips her off while he unzips his uniform.

He peels his T-shirt off and tosses it into the pile with the rest of his clothes. He starts making his way down the shore, towards the water. “I’m not going to say this again, Beomgyu, get out of there.”

“Oh shit.” Beomgyu says, his expression a perfect blend of terrified and turned on.

Ryujin lays on her back, watching the sky darken from orange to near black. The stars come out one by one – they’re arranged differently from the ones she’s used to seeing on the Moon, but it’s nice to see them again.

Someone soaking wet flops onto the sand next to her.

She turns to find their captain lying in the sand with a big smile on his face. Weird, but not unwelcome. “You’re pretty good at swimming.”

“I love swimming.” Yeonjun replies.

“I don’t think you’d do it for the past three hours if you didn’t.” Ryujin says.

Taehyun comes jogging over. “It’s happening again!”

Ryujin and Yeonjun sit up to see what Taehyun’s pointing at. Beomgyu and Chaeryeong are holding up their uniforms’ button cameras to take videos as the waves start to glow bright blue at their crests.

Yeonjun hops to his feet, brushing sand off his back with both hands (he barely gets any off). “Let’s have a barbeque dinner.”

Chaeryeong turns to him with a gasp. “Out here? Seriously?”

“I have that on video, Cappy.” Beomgyu says.

“Yeah, whatever, fuck it.” Yeonjun says. “We’re going to be stuck here for two weeks. Might as well have a good time.”

Ryujin smiles. “I’ll save the spot while you guys get the stuff.”

“You don’t really have much of a choice.” Taehyun says.

“Fuck you, Taehyun.” Ryujin waves him off amicably.

She lays on her back again, looking up at the stars while waiting for them to come back. Two weeks is a long time, but it doesn’t feel long enough after the hell she’d been through at the Academy. She should get forty years of vacation in this place, ten years for every year she suffered in the pilot program.

Ryujin snorts. _There’s my retirement plan figured out._

Something rustles behind her.

“Wow, real funny, guys.” Ryujin laughs as she sits up. “You know I’m not gonna get scared of…”

She sees her four crewmates in the distance, carrying blankets and food and things off the ship.

Ryujin turns around slowly. The forest behind her is a dark shadow she can hardly make out in the dim starlight.

Something rustles again.

“You’d _better_ not-”

A pair of large eyes glisten at the edge of the undergrowth, staring right at her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm on the bird app if u wanna scream at/with me: [@halp_rice](https://twitter.com/halp_rice)


	7. Got Milk?

The night breeze carries a strangled cry from further down the beach.

“Ryujin.” Taehyun gasps.

Yeonjun drops everything he’s carrying and starts running, with Chaeryeong and Beomgyu a few strides behind him.

Yeonjun pushes himself forward, sprinting faster than he ever had for the Academy’s physical fitness exams. “RYUJIN!”

Ryujin’s still screaming as a large silhouette drags her into the forest.

Yeonjun skids in the sand as he hangs a sharp left, running right into the forest’s dense, dark undergrowth.

“Yeonjun!” Chaeryeong yells, doubling over as she gasps for air.

Beomgyu collapses on the sand next to her. “Where- Where the fuck did they go?”

Chaeyreong cups her hands around her mouth. “YEONJUUUUUN!”

Fleshy winged creatures fly out of the tree cover, startled by the noise.

Taehyun catches up to them, panting as he watches the creatures fly overhead, blotting out the fading light from the sky above. “Wow.”

The ground is rough under Yeonjun’s feet as he runs, covering his soles with deep cuts that sting as they slip on the slimy, mossy growths underneath the dark black grass. He can barely stay on his feet, reaching out for any vine, branch, or leaf he can hold onto.

Yeonjun loses his footing, stumbling down a dark incline. His head hits something hard, and it sends the entire world spinning.

He hears Ryujin’s screams die out as she gets further and further.

Yeonjun rests a hand on a nearby tree trunk as he clambers to his feet. He feels something hot and wet trickling down the side of his face, but he ignores it.

He follows the faint shouts in the distance, stumbling and staggering through the forest as it grows darker and darker.

He reaches a clearing, landing on all fours.

On sand.

Yeonjun staggers to his feet. He’s back where he came from, but it’s much darker now than it had been when he’d entered the forest. The sky is near-black, and the stars seem further than ever.

“…Still not picking anything up, Chaeryeong, I think we should turn in.” Beomgyu’s walking past him, carrying a tablet and a rod that’s pulsating with red light.

Yeonjun’s eyes widen. _Why is he wearing his uniform? He wasn’t a while ago._

“Beomgyu-”

Beomgyu turns to him with his eyes saucer-wide. He drops everything he’s holding and pulls something out of his pocket.

It’s a knife. The laser edge of the blade glows near white.

“Beomgyu, what the hell.” Yeonjun says, taking a wary step back, but he’s lowered himself into a fighting stance. “It’s me.”

Beomgyu’s hand starts shaking, so he grips the knife’s hilt with both hands to steady it. “Chaeryeong? Taehyun? Come to my location now. I found something.”

“ _Something_?” Yeonjun makes a face. “It’s _me_ , Beomgyu.”

“Is that a person?” Chaeryeong’s voice buzzes over the lapel in Beomgyu’s collar. “Beomgyu, what the fuck is going on?”

Yeonjun takes advantage of the momentary distraction and knocks the knife out of Beomgyu’s grip with the back of one hand. He kicks the blade further down the beach and holds Beomgyu’s wrists together. He leans in to Beomgyu’s mic. “Chaeryeong? Hello? It’s me-”

“ _Yeonjun_?”

“Yes, who else? What are you-” Yeonjun clears his throat. It’s dry all of a sudden. “Report.”

“We’ve been looking for you and Ryujin for-”

“Stop, Chaeryeong.” Taehyun cuts in over the comms line. “We don’t know if that’s really him.”

Yeonjun frowns. “It _is_ me, what the hell are you guys-”

“Beomgyu?” Taehyun calls over the comms. “Beomgyu, please respond.”

“I’m here.” Beomgyu says quietly, still struggling to break free of Yeonjun’s hold. “I’m gonna need some help here.”

“Just stay there. We’re on the way.”

Yeonjun sighs. His crewmates really aren’t soldiers, and it _shows_.

“Guys.” Yeonjun groans when the other two arrive. “It _is_ me.”

“It _looks_ like him.” Chaeryeong says. “I think-”

“One way to find out.” Taehyun picks up the rod that Beomgyu had dropped earlier. He passes it over Yeonjun’s left forearm.

A small spot in his arm begins to glow, blinking his student number in Morse code.

Yeonjun looks up at Taehyun. “There. Convinced?”

“No.” Taehyun says. “Don’t lower that, Chaeryeong.”

Chaeryeong frowns, but lifts the stun gun in Yeonjun’s general direction again. Yeonjun sees that the safety latch isn’t even lifted.

Taehyun glares at Yeonjun. “What does your family do?”

“We grow soy and wheat.” Yeonjun says. “My mom’s the head engineer of Earth Quay 912.”

Taehyun looks at Chaeryeong. “Is that right?”

“What?” Chaeryeong sputters, waving the stun gun in frustration. Both Yeonjun and Beomgyu duck out of the way. “How would I know?”

“Y- You’re both from Earth, I figured-”

“Taehyun you Sector 2 _prick_ , they’re from different domes.” Beomgyu mutters. “He’s right about his family though. They’re farmers. Everyone in the captain program seems to know it.”

Yeonjun scowls. _It’s all Soobin’s fault._

Chaeryeong tucks the stun gun into her belt with a sigh.

Yeonjun lets Beomgyu’s hands go. “Sorry.” He says, when Beomgyu rubs the raw pink skin where he’d been holding him.

“Whatever.” Beomgyu runs a hand through his hair. “You have to teach me that knife thing sometime.”

Yeonjun gives him an apologetic look. “Sure.”

“This doesn’t make any sense.” Taehyun’s frowning at the display coming from his watch. “You’re showing up on my scans _now_.”

Yeonjun looks at the display. Taehyun’s scan has picked up four signatures: His own, Yeonjun’s, Chaeryeong’s, and Beomgyu’s.

“Where’s Ryujin’s tracker?” Yeonjun says, leaning in to squint at Taehyun’s watch display. “It should be there even if-”

“Even if she’s dead. I know.” Taehyun says, refreshing the scan. It comes up with just the same four results. “You were like that, too, until just now.”

Yeonjun stares at him. “What?”

“We’ve been looking for you two for… over two days now.” Chaeryeong says, checking her own watch.

“That can’t be.” Yeonjun shakes his head. “I was only in there for twenty minutes or so.”

“It’s three of us against you,” Beomgyu says. “We’ve been scanning the island for two days, but your and Ryujin’s trackers haven’t even shown up.”

Yeonjun looks up into the forest. It’s so dense that he can barely see a few meters in. “Let’s go back to the ship to rest and recoup.”

Beomgyu frowns. “But Ryujin-”

“If what happened to me is any indication, there’s something in the forest that seems to be blocking trackers, so we wouldn’t find her even if we scanned all night.” Yeonjun says. “We’ll start again in the morning. Maybe the starlight will help us.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun looks around, frowning.

He’s sitting in the captain’s chair of a bridge ten, maybe a hundred times larger than the _EXP Charlie_ ’s. Dozens of crewmates mill about below the dais his chair is on, but he doesn’t recognize a single one of them.

_Did I skip through time again?_

Yeonjun feels his own face. _How old am I now?_

A high-pitched sound, like a never-ending scream, starts echoing in his head. Yeonjun stumbles out of the chair and crumples to the floor.

“Yeonjun!” Someone’s arms wrap around him, catching him before he actually hits the floor. “Yeonjun, what’s wrong?”

The sound is hurting him so much he can hardly open his eyes. “I don’t know, I don’t-”

Yeonjun forces his eyes open and finds himself looking right up at Kim Soobin.

_Of all people._

Soobin gently brushes Yeonjun’s hair out of his face. “Are you hurt?”

“Don’t touch me.” Yeonjun pushes his hand away. He scrambles out of Soobin’s arms, though all he can manage in his current state is to crawl backwards on the floor. “What the hell is going on?”

Then he sees it. The view from the ship’s massive windshield is pure, jet black.

_What the hell?_

Soobin follows his line of sight, turning to the windshield with his face contorting in growing alarm. He reaches for Yeonjun’s hand. “Yeonjun, what-”

Yeonjun yanks his hand back, just as the lights in the bridge flicker. The darkness seems to seep in through the windshield, consuming everything in its path until Yeonjun and Soobin are in the last circle of light still untouched by the blank, velvety darkness.

Soobin looks up at Yeonjun with so much fear in his eyes, more fear than Yeonjun’s ever seen from another person, that Yeonjun doesn’t even flinch when he embraces him.

The darkness envelops them, dialing every sensation Yeonjun’s feeling down to complete numbness.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun jolts awake, taking a deep gasp of air, like he’d been drowning.

_It’s not real,_ Yeonjun reminds himself, but he flexes his fingers, only calming down when the feeling returns to his fingertips. _It’s not real._

He pulls his curtain back. It’s still dark out, but he doesn’t think he wants to go back to sleep anytime soon.

He climbs out of his bed, walking to the pantry to get himself a glass of water.

“Can’t sleep, either?”

Yeonjun nearly drops his glass in surprise. He _had_ seen Chaeryeong sitting by the window of the common area, but he’d thought she had fallen asleep there. “No.”

“I’ve been having weird dreams.”

Yeonjun turns the stream of water off. “Dreams are just your brain trying to process everything from the day.”

“I know that,” Chaeryeong laughs. “I _did_ pass my psych classes.”

“I know, I’m just saying: We’ve had a weird couple of days. Our brains are probably having a rough time making sense of it all.” Yeonjun takes a sip of water.

“What if it’s not just our brains confusing themselves?” Chaeryeong says.

Yeonjun frowns as he washes his glass. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, with you disappearing for two days but thinking you’d only been gone a few minutes,” Chaeryeong says. “It’s not that far-fetched.”

“What’s not far-fetched?”

“That someone’s trying to send us a message.” Chaeryeong says, frowning at Yeonjun in the dim ambient light, like that should’ve been his first conclusion. “It’s always the same person in my dreams. Maybe they’re trying to tell me something.”

Yeonjun gently places the glass in the drying rack, pushing it back into the wall. _Soobin’s trying to tell me something? It would be extremely petty, even for him, to use this telepathic method just to gloat._

“Try to get some rest, Chaeryeong.” Yeonjun says, drying his hands on his t-shirt. “We’ll set out at first light.”

The island is as bright and beautiful as ever as the sun gently creeps up on the horizon, but Taehyun just can’t look at it the same way. He turns away from his window to stir a few spoons of reconstituted egg into his coffee.

“Any updates on the comms system, Taehyun?” Yeonjun asks from where he’s standing by the induction cooker, scrubbing the pan he’d used to fry rice earlier.

If Taehyun had been more paranoid, he would have stabbed the captain then and there. _He cooked enough for all of us. Definitely a doppelganger._

_Oh. Then I probably shouldn’t have eaten the fried rice. If a doppelganger made it._

_Damn._

“Taehyun, updates?” Yeonjun asks again.

“The comms system is still working perfectly fine. But we haven’t received any transmissions.” Taehyun says. “And I don’t know if any of the ones I’ve been sending have actually made it.”

“Maybe no one’s just been sending us transmissions.” Beomgyu says.

“We’re supposed to get updates from the Academy every 24 internal hours, but we haven’t.” Taehyun says. “They’re usually not important updates, but it’s a way to see if your comms system’s, uh… alive.”

“I thought you said our system was working fine.” Yeonjun says.

“The system is fine-” Taehyun frowns, but not as hard as his crewmates are frowning at him. _Why don’t they get it?_ “It’s like being in a dark room and opening your eyes. Your eyes are working, but you don’t see anything. That’s how our comms system is right now.”

Chaeryeong takes a deep breath. “That sounds horrible, Taehyun.”

“It is.” Taehyun finishes his coffee and lowers the mug into the sink. Yeonjun takes it and starts washing it before Taehyun can stop him.

_Definitely a doppelganger._

“Beomgyu, updates on the scan you ran last night?” Yeonjun rinses Taehyun’s mug and shakes it out before resting it in the drying rack.

Taehyun frowns at the engineer. _What scan?_

“I had the ship scan the whole fucking planet while we were sleeping.” Beomgyu explains. “Two things, basically: One, still no Ryujin, and two, the planet _does_ have a magnetic field, probably from the iron core, but it’s way too weak to be fucking with our comms. It’s just like Earth’s.”

Chaeryeong makes a strange noise when Beomgyu says that. It’s like a cross between a cough and a gasp.

“Okay.” Yeonjun wipes his hands on a hand towel before tucking the entire kitchen into the wall. “Here’s the plan for this morning. Taehyun, work on getting the comms system back online-”

“It _is_ online.” Taehyun cuts in.

“I won’t count it as online until we get the Academy’s transmissions.” Yeonjun says.

Taehyun nods. “Should we send out an SOS?”

Yeonjun takes a breath. “No, hold on that. We haven’t hit the 72-hour mark for Ryujin yet.”

“Seventy-two hours is too long to wait.” Beomgyu says. “Ryujin’s-”

“We’re following protocol.” Yeonjun says, in a tone that lets them all know it’s not up for debate. “Beomgyu, you and I will fly drones into the forest. Chaeryeong, you’ll stand guard. Bring the stun gun and the stasis stretcher. Any questions?”

Taehyun watches Beomgyu and Chaeryeong open their mouths, then reconsider and close them again, shaking their heads.

“Good.” Yeonjun says. “Let’s go.”

Ryujin sits up groggily. Music’s washing over her, like a choir of off-key senior citizens.

“Not a bop.” Ryujin murmurs, rubbing her eyes.

The light around her is so bright that it takes a few minutes for her eyes to adjust.

_Holy fuck I’m dead._

Ryujin finds that she’s sitting in a shallow pool of clear water. Then she sees the creatures standing in a circle around her, singing their awful song.

Ryujin rises to her feet, nearly slipping on the mossy rocks below. _Weapon. I don’t have a weapon._

She lowers herself into a vague approximation of a fighting stance, hands straight like knives. _Fuck it, they probably don’t know any martial arts, either._

One of the creatures steps into the water with Ryujin. It’s big and reddish, with a squarish, broad body, and four legs with feet with no fingers as far as Ryujin can see. It has these big brown eyes that look just enough like Ryujin’s and just _not_ enough like Ryujin’s to creep her the fuck out.

“Don’t fuck with me,” Ryujin says, holding out her knife-hands. “If you come any closer I’m taking your fucking eye out.”

The creature does come closer, blinking its huge eyes lazily.

Then it nuzzles its head into Ryujin’s outstretched arms.

“Oh hell no,” Ryujin says, backing up. “If you try to eat me I will _kill_ you and roast you for dinner-”

The creature lowers itself into the water, looking up at Ryujin with its mouth curled into something that looks almost like a smile.

Ryujin cocks her head to one side. “Okay, fine, you’re _kinda_ cute.”

Ryujin pats the creature on the head.

The creature lets out a happy-sounding noise.

“Okay, you’re _super_ cute,” Ryujin laughs as four more of the same creature come up to her, nuzzling their heads against her back. “Okay, okay, playtime’s over. Anyone know the way out of here? I’ve got to get back to my friends.”

Chaeryeong frowns. “What?”

“We’ve gone through half the drones. We only have four left.” Beomgyu says, hugging the one in his arms protectively. He shoots Yeonjun a distrustful look. “I’m not letting you send any more in there.”

Yeonjun sighs. “Don’t you want to find Ryujin?”

“We’re just throwing away perfectly good drones here and we’re not any closer to finding-”

“YO WASSUP GUYS!”

Chaeryeong has no expectations at this point – she just wants Ryujin to come back. But her mouth drops open when Ryujin skips calmly out of the forest, followed by a herd of…

“Are those cows?” Chaeryeong squints at the animals Ryujin’s leading towards them.

Beomgyu nearly drops his beloved drone. “What’s a cow?”

Yeonjun frowns at him for a moment before turning back to Ryujin. “They’re where beef comes from.”

“Beef comes from _those_ things?” Beomgyu gags.

“Not exactly.” Chaeryeong takes a terrified step back when the cow-like creatures come closer. They’re _very_ tall cows, most of them taller than Yeonjun. _Aka towering over_ me _._

“Hey guys, sorry if anyone was worried about me,” Ryujin says, giving them a casual grin.

No one’s looking at her. They’re gaping at the seven-foot-tall cows.

“Oh , these guys are my friends,” Ryujin says, patting two of the kinda-cows on their muzzles. “This is Bob, and this one’s Joe-bob, and this one’s Bobert-”

“Ryujin, please stop touching them.” Yeonjun snaps, spit flecking out of his mouth in fear.

“Ah, no, no they’re friendly.” Ryujin says. She does stop petting the creatures. “Where’s Taehyun?”

“B- Back on the ship.” Beomgyu’s hugging his drone more tightly now, like a little kid does with a stuffed animal.

“Oh, he’s gonna _love_ these guys.” Ryujin says.

Taehyun _does_ love the creatures Ryujin discovered. He takes notes and photos and eventually gives up on documenting things to join Ryujin in petting them.

“I don’t like this.” Yeonjun says in a low voice, turning to Beomgyu and Chaeryeong, who have stayed a respectful and terrified couple of meters away.

“I fucking _hate_ this.” Beomgyu says. “Let’s go back in now.”

“I don’t disagree.” Chaeryeong says, shrinking behind Yeonjun when one of the creatures looks at her.

Yeonjun shoots the creature a hard look, and it looks away bashfully. They seem to be quite docile, but he’s seen horses much smaller than these break someone’s arm.

He walks over taking deep breaths to calm himself while the creatures turn to him with a disconcerting amount of curiosity in the big, brown eyes.

“Taehyun.” Yeonjun’s voice cracks, and Ryujin starts laughing.

“You hear that, Joe-bob?” Ryujin nudges the creature next to her, which lets out an amused whinny.

Yeonjun hates this. “Taehyun, do you have all the documentation we need?”

Taehyun’s busy laughing as one of the creatures blows hot, wet air at him.

“Taehyun.” Yeonjun squeaks out. “Can we go now?”

“What?” Ryujin gives him a textbook puppy-dog look. “ _Now_? But-”

“We haven’t had a meeting in- Please don’t touch me.” Yeonjun flinches away from one of the creatures, which has bent its’ head to inspect him more closely. “P- Please.”

“Aww, are you _scared_?” Ryujin laughs, reaching out to pinch Yeonjun’s cheek.

Yeonjun shuts his eyes. _That hand just touched every creature here. If any of them has a disease, then I’ve got it now. I’m dead. Thanks, Ryujin._

“E- Everyone back to the ship, _now_!” Yeonjun says, loud enough to startle the creatures around him. “That’s an order!”

“Well?” Ryujin peeks one eye open, looking up at Chaeryeong. She’s lying on the table in the common area again, held down by the boys, though she’s not sure why. “How am I?”

Chaeryeong ignores her and turns to Yeonjun. “She’s ridiculously healthy.”

“That’s a good thing, isn’t it?” Yeonjun frowns.

“Yes and no.” Chaeryeong says. “Her leg was broken just a few days ago.” She points at Ryujin’s smooth white leg. “There’s no trace of it now. Not even a scar. It should’ve taken at least three weeks to heal with the medicine we put on it.”

“That’s great, right?” Ryujin grins.

Taehyun turns and reaches for something in the kitchen.

He comes back with a knife, laser edge glowing brightly. “I knew something was wrong with her.”

“Put that back before you hurt somebody.” Beomgyu snaps at him. “This is Ryujin. Her tag checks out.”

Ryujin lifts her left arm, zipper and all. “Yeah, you can check again, just please don’t stab me.”

Chaeryeong’s face goes pale when she sees the zipper.

“Ryujin,” Yeonjun says, frowning down at Ryujin as he lowers her arm. “Do you remember anything from the past couple of days?”

Ryujin shrugs. “Dunno, it was kind of like… You know when you drink too much and you black out-”

“Ryujin, please be serious.”

“I _am_!” Ryujin flicks Beomgyu with one finger. “You know what I mean, right? When you get totally wasted and-”

“Don’t lump me with you.” Beomgyu makes a face. “I’ve never gotten _wasted_.”

“Anyway it felt like that!” Ryujin says. “I don’t remember a thing! Sorry!”

Yeonjun sighs.

“You could ask Joe-bob and the others.” Ryujin offers.

The look Yeonjun gives her is so cold it could put a whole star out. “No.”

“But they’re the ones who brought me back to you guys,” Ryujin says.

“From where?” Taehyun asks.

“We were in this like, puddle in the middle of the forest.” Ryujin says. “It smelled kinda like moonshine whisky, but also marshmallows.”

Yeonjun groans and starts walking away. “Chaeryeong, do a blood test for any illegal substances.”

Chaeryeong swallows. “Do I really have to?”

“Oh, it’s easy to get blood from me,” Ryujin says, lifting her arm. She undoes the zipper in it, revealing layers of pink flesh inside. “You just have to-”

Chaeryeong faints, falling on top of Beomgyu.

“What the _fuck_ , Ryujin!” He whines.

Taehyun stops typing. “I need some space to work, Captain.”

“Sorry.” Yeonjun takes one, tiny step back from Taehyun’s station. But he’s still looking over Taehyun’s shoulder, which Taehyun hates.

He starts typing again anyway. “I’ll need a dummy transmission to send out. Something we won’t mind getting out for real.”

Beomgyu’s spinning around aimlessly in his chair. He’s already granted Taehyun access to all of the ship’s sensors, so he has nothing to do at the moment. “Send a message to Kim Soobin.”

Their captain reacts so violently that Taehyun chuckles. He types in the roaming address of _EXP Alpha_ and hits the record button. “What message, Captain?”

“I don’t want to send Soobin _jack shit._ ” Yeonjun sputters back angrily.

“Perfect, thanks.” Taehyun says, hitting the _Send transmission_ button.

“W- Wait!” Yeonjun chokes out.

Beomgyu and Taehyun laugh as Yeonjun’s less-than-friendly message beams out from the ship and towards the island.

Ryujin raises a boot. “I still don’t get how this is going to find the magic whisky marshmallow pond.”

Taehyun had forgotten she was there. She was being uncharacteristically quiet for Ryujin. _Because she’s a doppelganger._

“We’re using the ship’s comms system as a form of echolocation to map out a rough terrain of the island.” Yeonjun explains. “Take your shoes off the dashboard.”

Ryujin doesn’t budge her boots. “Why don’t you just use the ship’s normal scanners?”

“Don’t you think we tried that, genius?” Beomgyu rolls his eyes. “What’s happening, Taehyun?”

“Processing the initial echoes. Oh. Render’s starting.” Taehyun switches his station to hologram mode as a rough 3D render of the island starts building itself before them. It’s all jagged polygons that look nothing like the island, but it’s better than nothing.

Ryujin hops out of her seat and skips over.

“See anything familiar?” Yeonjun asks her.

“Uh, can you make it clearer?” Ryujin makes a face at the amorphous, pointed blob being projected out of Taehyun’s station.

“No.” Taehyun says.

“Can you zoom in?”

“No.”

Ryujin pouts at the captain. “Well, sorry, it doesn’t look like anything- What’s that?”

Taehyun highlights the part she’s pointing at in a different color. It’s awful and jagged like the rest of the model, but there seems to be a deep dimple in it. A strangely curved, symmetrical dimple.

“That’s probably it.” Ryujin says. “I remember it was a circle and I could see the sun and it was _so_ bright and-”

“Suddenly you’re remembering a lot.” Beomgyu narrows his eyes at her.

Taehyun follows suit. _This planted doppelganger isn’t even subtle._

“We can check it out after lunch.” Yeonjun says, saving a copy of the map to his tablet.

“Oh, whose turn is it to make lunch now?” Ryujin asks.

“I’ll do it.” Yeonjun slides the door open.

Beomgyu looks up with concern. “But you already made breakfast-”

The door to the bridge slides shut.

“Okay, sure, go ahead, I guess.” Beomgyu raises his hands as if in defeat.

“Wait, he made breakfast for _everyone_?” Ryujin frowns. She turns and whacks Taehyun on the arm. “ _He’s_ the one you should be stabbing! Since when did he give enough fucks about us to do shit like that?”

Taehyun rubs his sore arm, but he nods in agreement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Ryujin Day!!!
> 
> Also Yeonjun made a beautiful cover, if you haven't listened to it you can find it [here](https://soundcloud.com/txt190304/yeonjuns-song-cry/s-yRrSG7es4ar)!


	8. Not Milk

Beomgyu scrolls down his comic aimlessly. He doesn’t mind being left behind to look after Chaeryeong and the ship. He’s not much of a volunteer-y person, especially not when volunteering would mean going out and interacting with those _things_.

Beomgyu shudders. _Guess I’m never having beef again._

He keeps scrolling, not bothering to read the words. The comic he’s reading is shit. It’s predictable, the male lead isn’t interesting in the least, and the art isn’t even nice enough to justify reading another chapter.

He closes the tab and goes on to the next one out of forty-eight he has open.

There’s a rustle from Chaeryeong’s bed-shelf. She’s been moving around in her sleep for the past couple of minutes, but this is a _lot_ of moving, even for her.

Beomgyu puts the tablet down on the table and pulls Chaeryeong’s curtain back a bit. “Hey, you good?”

Chaeryeong’s arms are thrashing around. “No!” She gasps out, barely above a whisper.

“Hey.” Beomgyu shakes her by the shoulder. “Wake up-”

“Jeongin!” Chaeryeong screams, but silently, like when you’re trying to talk to someone far away but still whisper. “Jeongin! No!”

Beomgyu frowns. _That… can’t be good._

He shakes her harder. “Chaeryeong! Wake up!”

Her entire body rattles, like she’s being electrocuted, then her eyes shoot open so suddenly that Beomgyu jumps back in surprise.

“Fucking hell, Chaeryeong!”

Chaeryeong sits up, gasping for air. She turns to Beomgyu slowly. “Did I hit you? Oh my gosh, I’m so-”

“What the fuck was that?” Beomgyu yells from where he’s fallen on the floor.

“I- It was just a dream, that happens a lot, don’t worry.”

“ _Don’t worry_?” He doesn’t bother getting up. “You looked like you were having a fucking _seizure_ , how am I not supposed to worry?”

Chaeryeong looks more embarrassed than concerned, which completely fucking baffles Beomgyu. “Did I say anything?”

Beomgyu can’t believe her. “Just ‘No!’ and ‘Jeongin!’… Everything fine with you two?”

Chaeryeong bends over suddenly, burying her face in her hands.

“Oh crap, Chaeryeong, it’s okay, he’s not _that_ great,” Beomgyu says, rising to his feet to pat her on the head. “He was actually a shitty kisser-”

“No, no, it’s not like that.” Chaeryeong sighs. “I’ve just been having this recurring dream. With him in it.”

“Oh. I don’t want to hear it.”

“It’s not like _that_.” Chaeryeong flicks him on the arm. “We’re back in the- We’re both on Earth, looking at the sky, and it’s nice, like we’re on a date-”

“On _Earth_?” Beomgyu asks, lifting one eyebrow.

“There are nice date places on Earth too, you asshole.” Chaeryeong scowls at him. Then she sighs again. “Anyway, we’re both looking at the sky, then it starts to become dark-”

“I think that’s what they call night.”

Chaeryeong glares at him. “Not _night_ dark. Like, _black_ dark. It’s this big black nothing that eats everything up, even us, and when you’re in it, nothing happens anymore. I wake up.”

Beomgyu blinks at her. “I think I’d prefer to hear about your wet dreams.”

Chaeryeong grumbles. “It’s been happening _every_ time I fall asleep, even if I just pass out – Isn’t that weird? _Every time_?”

Beomgyu covers his ears. “Can we talk about something else, please?”

Chaeryeong flops back onto her bed with a loud groan. Then she turns to Beomgyu with an expression that makes Beomgyu more than a little worried.

“What is it?” Beomgyu asks, backing up into the table.

“Do you think Jeongin uh, made out with a _lot_ of people other than you and me?” Chaeryeong grimaces.

Beomgyu can’t help it anymore. He laughs, even when Chaeryeong throws her pillow at him.

“See, I told you Joe-bob knows the way,” Ryujin says, patting the creature on the head as she walks alongside it.

“There it is!” Taehyun, who’s walking behind Ryujin and between two of the creatures, starts pointing at something Yeonjun can’t see yet.

Yeonjun needs one hand out to steady himself against the trees, because the ground under their boots is slippery with moss, but he’s got one hand on the stun gun in his pocket. _Just in case._

Yeonjun steps out into the clearing, which is lined with small pebbles. They remind him of the ones in his grandmother’s decorative plant pots, too smooth and round to be natural.

Ryujin and Taehyun are already skidding down the slope of pebbles towards the water.

Yeonjun does _not_ follow.

It’s clear and shallow, so you can see the mossy bottom of the pond, but the breeze carries the smell to Yeonjun and roots him to the spot.

There’s a plant that some people on Earth grow to smoke and eat, even though it’s always been illegal, even from before the Moon City had been built.

_It smells like that._ Yeonjun thinks, pinching his nose.

“Guys, let’s-”

He hears two small splashes. _Goddamn._

Yeonjun sighs as he walks down to the shore. Taehyun and Ryujin are laughing already, splashing each other with the foul-smelling water.

“Stop it, I thought we were just taking samples and-” Yeonjun stops in midsentence, because Taehyun’s just splashed some of the water into his mouth.

Taehyun and Ryujin stare at him with wide eyes.

Yeonjun closes his mouth slowly. His mouth begins to feel warm. And mushy. And sweet. _Like yams_.

“Let’s get the samples and go.” Someone says.

_Gosh, this person’s annoying._ Yeonjun scrunches up his face.

_Oh. It’s me. I’m the annoying person._

Yeonjun stumbles into the pond between Ryujin and Taehyun, who are just watching him. He’s soaked his uniform to his knees, but it’s not cold. Or warm. It’s just right.

Then he grins and splashes them with both hands.

“Oh, you’re going _down_ , Captain!” Ryujin yells, tackling him like a pro-wrestler. They barrel into Taehyun, who offers no resistance as the three of them fall into the pond.

Yeonjun sits up, laughing as he wipes the water off his face.

“Yeah, so that’s why I couldn’t date anyone in the engineering program anymore.” Beomgyu tosses a marshmallow at Chaeryeong, who leans to her right to catch it with her mouth.

Chaeryeong chews pensively. “That’s pretty rude of them.” She picks up a marshmallow and tosses it at Beomgyu.

It bounces off his nose and onto the floor.

“Crap!” Beomgyu laughs, diving out of his chair to grab the marshmallow. He’s just blown it off and popped it into his mouth when the door to the common area slides open.

“Beomgyu!”

Beomgyu rises to his feet with a sharp salute. “C- Captain, I-”

Yeonjun wraps his arms around Beomgyu and swings him around in a circle.

Beomgyu frowns back at Chaeryeong, who’s too busy frowning at the open doorway.

Ryujin comes cartwheeling in.

“Stop, stop, you’ll hurt your-” Chaeryeong stands up just as Ryujin crashes into the table, laughing. “What the fuck?”

Beomgyu notices Taehyun standing in the doorway. “KANG TAEHYUN!”

Taehyun walks in camly. “Hello, friends.”

Chaeryeong’s covered her eyes with both hands. “Where did your clothes go!?”

“Huh?” Taehyun looks down. He looks genuinely surprised to see his own junk. “Weird. I was just wearing them.”

“I love you, Beomgyu, you know that?” Yeonjun says, patting Beomgyu on the head.

Beomgyu pushes him away – _Imagine that, I pushed_ Yeonjun _away._ “What the fuck is going on?”

Ryujin does another cartwheel, right into the wall. “We went to the pond and had some FUN JUICE!”

“FUN JUUUUICE!” Yeonjun yells, jumping around.

“We had a… blast.” Taehyun adds, facing the opposite wall.

Chaeryeong grabs Beomgyu by the arm, still covering her eyes with one hand. “What the hell do we do about them?”

Beomgyu makes a face at her and pushes her hand away from her face. “Oh come on, Chaeryeong, it’s as if you haven’t seen a naked man before.”

“I HAVEN’T!” Chaeryeong yells at him, eyes screwed shut.

Beomgyu frowns at her in horror. “You _haven’t_?”

“NO! I HAVEN’T!” Chaeryeong’s entire head is becoming a bright red color. “PUT SOME FUCKING CLOTHES ON TAEHYUN! I’LL ROUND RYUJIN AND YEONJUN UP!”

Chaeryeong crosses her arms, looking over the three people sitting on the floor of the bridge with thinly veiled irritation. “What do you guys have to say for yourselves?”

“Sorry.” Ryujin mutters.

Yeonjun just shakes his head and pulls the blanket around his shoulders tighter around him. “It won’t happen again.”

“It better not!” Beomgyu pretends to make a motion to kick him. “Annoying-ass motherf-”

“All of our data.” Taehyun says, fiddling with the zipper of his fresh lavender uniform.

“What?” Beomgyu nudges him with one foot. “The fuck are-”

Ryujin gasps loudly. “All of our data was in Taehyun’s watch.”

“Didn’t it sync with the ship?” Chaeryeong asks.

“My mom’s gonna kill me.” Taehyun says, rubbing his bare, naked wrist. “I have to get that back. My mom’s going to _kill_ me.”

Beomgyu rubs his temples. “Where did you leave it?”

“In the Fun Juice pool.” Ryujin and Taehyun sigh at once.

Chaeryeong lets out an exasperated noise. “What are we going to-”

“We have to go back.”

Everyone turns to Yeonjun with different levels of surprise.

“ _Excuse me_?” Beomgyu actually kicks him.

Yeonjun just lays on his side, half-covered with a shock blanket. “We have to go back to the Fun Juice pool.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“He’s here.” Ryujin nudged Beomgyu as she lowered their – just the four of them, of course, no cranky Captains included – lunch onto the table. “Hey Captain-”

“I’ll make my own lunch, thanks.” Yeonjun said curtly, turning his back to them to poke around the pantry.

“No,” Ryujin rolled her eyes. “I was wondering if you drink.”

Yeonjun turned to her with a knife-sharp glare. “Alcohol is banned on all Fleet ships. Even this one. _Especially_ this one.”

“Yeah, haha, don’t worry, I don’t have a stash hidden away, don’t worry,” Ryujin slapped him playfully on the arm.

Beomgyu stirred the noodles on the table thoughtfully. “So, do you drink, Cappy?”

“No.” Yeonjun picked an energy bar before closing the pantry.

Ryujin stuck her tongue out at Beomgyu, holding out her hand in the universally accepted sign of, _Pay up, fool._

“Not even once?” Beomgyu asked, blocking Yeonjun’s way. “ _Never_?”

Yeonjun ignored him, peeling the wrapper away from his energy bar.

“Like, not even a _single_ sip of-”

“I’ve had alcohol.” Yeonjun glared at Beomgyu, as if asking what he’s insinuating.

“Yeah, but you’ve never gotten _drunk_ , right?” Ryujin walked behind Yeonjun to mouth at Beomgyu, ‘Admit you lost, loser.’

Yeonjun took an angry bite of his energy bar, sidestepping Beomgyu to leave the common area.

“Wait.” Ryujin ran after him. “You’ve _never_ gotten drunk, right?”

Yeonjun bit into his energy bar, chewing for a long time before saying, “Do you both not have enough work?”

“No, we’ve got plenty.” Beomgyu laughed, clamping a hand over Ryujin’s mouth.

Ryujin licked his hand until he let go. “Yeah, we’re good, Captain.”

Yeonjun scoffed once, then turned to leave the common area.

Beomgyu wiped his hand off on Ryujin’s sleeve, screwing his face up in disgust. “Can you _act_ like a normal person for once in your-”

“Wait, so who won the bet?” Ryujin asked.

“Crap.” Beomgyu frowned right back. “I don’t know.”

They stared at the closed door.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun stops in his tracks, extending a hand to stop the others as well. “No one touches the water, do you understand?”

“ _What_?” Ryujin squawks from the back of the line.

“No one. Touches. The. Water.” Yeonjun says forcefully.

Ryujin hangs her head. “Fine.”

Taehyun slips under Yeonjun’s outstretched arm, skidding down the slope of smooth pebbles.

“Taehyun!” Yeonjun scowls.

“I’m just getting my things!” Taehyun says, raising both hands like he’s being arrested. He crunches a few steps along the pool’s shore to the pile of discarded clothes by the far side of the pool.

Yeonjun crosses his arms. “Hurry.”

Chaeryeong covers her nose and mouth with one hand. “What is that _smell?_ ”

“What?” Beomgyu frowns at her. “It smells like candy.”

“No, it doesn’t.” Chaeryeong looks like she’s about to vomit.

Ryujin puts an arm around her. “Hey, Taehyun, hurry up!”

Taehyun bundles up the clothes in his arms. “Wait, I can’t find my watch!”

Yeonjun groans, stepping out into the dying starlight to squint around the shore. _If those cow-things stole it, I am going to make_ burgers _of them._

“There it is!” Taehyun points at the pool. “Oh no.”

The surface of the pool is smooth as a mirror, but with the light fading to a dim orange around them, you can see the bottom. Sure enough, the teal wristband of Taehyun’s watch just barely peeks out from the pebbles at the bottom of the pond.

_Son of a bitch._ Yeonjun glares up at Taehyun. “Don’t you dare.”

“I’m not!” Taehyun holds his bundle of clothes up. “But how are we going to-”

“I’ll get it.”

“Cappy.” Beomgyu says, sounding uncharacteristically alarmed as he does. “Are you sure?”

“Someone’s got to.” Yeonjun says, already walking down the shore.

Ryujin squeezes her arm around Chaeryeong. “Wait, the Captain’s kind of a lightweight-”

“Yeonjun, no-”

Yeonjun steps into the water, half-diving to duck his upper body in deep enough to pick up the watch.

He straightens up and looks at his palm.

His empty palm.

_Shit._ Yeonjun’s mind starts to go mushy. His mouth is starting to taste sweet. _SHIT!_

He ducks into the water again, searching with both hands for the watch.

_Splash, splash._

_This is kinda fun._

_Fun Juice._

_Splash!_

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun was a person who said “No” a lot. He never intended to, but that was always how things turned out.

“Wanna study with us?” Some of his classmates asked once.

He knew they’d just seen that he’d come out ranked second in the entire program, and that they were being opportunistic vultures who just didn’t have the gall to leech off of Kim Soobin.

“No.” He’d said, slinging his bag over his shoulder to leave them.

Other times, his classmates’ intentions were kinder. “We’re all having dinner together. Wanna come?”

Yeonjun couldn’t understand how they could calmly go out to dinner when there were three papers and four exams to think about. So he’d said, “No, thanks.”

There was one time he had a different answer, though.

“You didn’t come out to the Rank Drop,” Chan said, coming back to the dorm room that evening, sweaty from crowding with the others waiting to learn their ranks for the semester.

“No, I didn’t.” Yeonjun had lain in bed all afternoon with his earphones in, though he’d forgotten to switch the music on. He was done caring about school. He had worked his hardest, not enjoyed himself at all for the past three years, and all for nothing. _People like me will never come out on top of people like Kim Soobin._

“Well, there’s still one last Rank Drop next sem.” Chan flopped onto his bed. “They don’t hold a Rank Drop for the last semester before graduation anymore.”

Yeonjun lay there staring at the ceiling as if he hadn’t heard.

“A bunch of us are going out to celebrate. The engineering guys are holding a party.” Chan said.

Yeonjun was already preparing to give his roommate a crisp, but well-meaning, “No thanks.”

“Oh, and you’re ranked first.”

Yeonjun hadn’t been listening to music, but he plucked his earphones out anyway. “Pardon?”

“You came first.” Chan’s grin was genuine. Yeonjun didn’t think him capable of a trick this cruel, anyway. “Congrats, dude.”

Yeonjun rose to his feet in a _second_. “Really?”

Chan laughed. “You should see your face right now.”

Yeonjun could’ve looked like an ogre at that moment, he wouldn’t have cared. He was an ogre who was ranked first in the entire captain program. After _three_ years.

“Yeonjuuuuun! Congratulations, oh my god, _you_ _did it_!”

Yeonjun didn’t know this classmate of his well enough to know whether she was teasing him, “Thanks, Jiwon.”

Jiwon smacked her hand on the bar. “Hey, give my friend a drink!”

Yeonjun had two problems with that statement. “Uh… hold on.”

The bartender just laughed at them both. “And who’s paying for that drink?”

“I will.”

Yeonjun frowned. “No thanks.”

“Aw, come on,” Soobin tapped his credit fob on the counter before Yeonjun could stop him. He put both hands up in mock defeat. “Oops, no can do, I paid for it already.”

“Can I have one, too?” Jiwon asked.

Yeonjun frowned at her cheeks, which were pink even in the bar’s dim lights. “No, Jiwon, you’re already-”

“Sure, why not?” Soobin tapped his credit fob again.

“What about you, sir?” The bartender asked Soobin as he slid Yeonjun a bright blue drink.

Yeonjun just stared at the pulsating glow coming from the drink. Or the glass. Either way, he wasn’t going to put something _that_ bright into his body.

Jiwon caught her drink and swallowed it in one almost impressive gulp. She grinned up at Yeonjun, her teeth stained a faintly glowing blue.

_Oh. It’s in the drink. Yikes._

“I’ll just have the same.” Soobin shrugged, tapping his credit fob a third time.

“We have higher-end options, sir,” The bartender said, looking a little nervous.

“Why?” Soobin frowned. “What’s in their drink?”

“N- Nothing bad, of course, it’s just, uh,” The bartender lowered his voice to say, “The cheaper stuff.”

Soobin shrugged. “I’ll have the cheap stuff, then.”

“You can have this one.” Yeonjun slid the glass to Soobin.

Soobin had given him this smile that Yeonjun didn’t like. “No, that’s yours. Congrats on first rank.”

Yeonjun had glared at Soobin for a long time.

Then he’d picked up the glass and swallowed it in one go that scorched his throat. He just barely managed to keep a straight enough face to choke out, “Congrats on second.”

Soobin had laughed then, tapping his credit fob yet another time. “Another one for him.”

“…and- and she said it was _over_ over! How could she just say that! After everything we’ve been through!” Jiwon wailed above the noise blasting from the bar’s speakers. She rested her head on Yeonjun’s shoulder. “You’re such a great listener, Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun gently pushed her head off of him with one finger. “Stay away from me, it’s too warm.”

Jiwon opened her mouth to say something just as a new song came over the bar’s deafening sound system. She jumped up in her seat and started clapping. “Come dance with me, Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun frowned at her, already forming out the word, “No.”

But Jiwon was much faster and stronger than he’d anticipated her to be. She tugged him out onto the dance floor so hard he was vaguely worried that she’d dislocated his shoulder.

Yeonjun frowned as Jiwon danced around him.

“Come on, Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun started bobbing his head to the beat.

“That’s more like it!”

Yeonjun put his shoulders into it, moving them to the music.

“Yaaaaaaas Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun started moving his arms. _This song isn’t bad._

Then he realized he had put his _everything_ into dancing, and that he loved dancing.

“Fuck it uuuuup!” Jiwon yelled, from what sounded like very far away.

Yeonjun didn’t really know anymore. _Whatever_.

He knocked into someone.

“Sorry.” He barely managed to mumble out. _Why am I so slow?_

“It’s okay,” The someone said with a little laugh. It was a stupid-sounding laugh. Yeonjun liked it.

Yeonjun started dancing again with this person. _Dancing is fun._

_Good thing I never went to these things before._

_I love dancing._

The person’s hands held Yeonjun. He was going to complain that it was too warm, and he was too sweaty for that.

But he liked it.

He also liked it when they came closer to him, and their warm breath fell on Yeonjun’s face.

Yeonjun tilted his chin up to say something, but he’d misjudged the distance between them.

Their lips touched for a split second.

“Oh.” They’d said, staggering away from Yeonjun.

Yeonjun reached up and touched his mouth numbly. “Sorry.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Fuck it up, Captain!”

Yeonjun blinks the water out of his eyes. It’s dark, but everything around him is lit up from beneath by a familiar bright blue glow.

Music is blasting the speakers of Taehyun’s watch, which is resting on a nearby rock.

Ryujin and Chaeryeong are bouncing together like they’re at a disco, while Taehyun leads Beomgyu through a clumsy waltz.

Yeonjun smiles and starts dancing again, to a beat that’s throbbing in his head. It might be his pulse, for all he cares. At least it’s still there.

“Have I every told you guys!” Beomgyu says, dropping both of Taehyun’s hands to link arms with the two girls. “How much I love you!”

Ryujin pecks him on the cheek. “I love you too!”

“I love you guys!” Taehyun throws his arms into a giant heart above his head. He loses his footing, but Yeonjun catches him before he bashes his head on a rock or something.

Yeonjun laughs. “We’ve only known each other for a couple of days.”

“No!” Chaeryeong slaps him on the shoulder, hard enough that Yeonjun winces. “I’ve known you for four _years_! You just kept ignoring me! HAH! Try ignoring me _now_!”

“Beomgyu and I went to primary school together!” Ryujin raises her hand. “But I didn’t say anything because I just knew him as the bed-wetter kid!”

“OH MY GOD!” Beomgyu shrieks, doubling over in embarrassment. “SHIN RYUJIN!”

“Oops.” Ryujin covers her mouth with both hands.

Taehyun spins around, arms above his head like a ballerina. “I didn’t know any of you guys until the other day! I didn’t talk to anyone in the Academy!”

“Me neither!” Yeonjun laughs, spinning around after Taehyun.

“What’s Kim Soobin, then?” Beomgyu flicks Yeonjun on the arm.

“An asshole!” Yeonjun kicks a foot over his head. “I hate him!”

“Then why’d you make out with him?” Taehyun asks. He dodges a sloppy punch from Yeonjun. “Beomgyu’s the one who told the whole bridge! While you were having lunch alone!”

“I am _never_ having lunch alone ever again.” Yeonjun ruffles his hair in frustration.

“If _I_ had made out with _the_ General’s son, I would never shut up about it.” Beomgyu says.

“You already won’t shut up about it.” Yeonjun glares at him.

“Shh, dudes, _chill_ ,” Ryujin says, wriggling between them to the beat of the music from Taehyun’s watch. She takes one of Yeonjun’s hands and twirls him. “Beomgyu’s just jealous-”

“What?” Yeonjun scoffs, taking Ryujin’s other hand to spin _her_ around. He makes a face at Beomgyu. “He’s not that great. Trust me.”

“You fucking _idiot_!” Beomgyu sputters before breaking out into hacking laughter.

“What?” Yeonjun tries to spin again, but his foot catches on a rock at the bottom of the pool, sending him falling butt-first into the water.

“Beomgyu thinks _you’re_ hot, not Kim Soobin.” Chaeryeong says, extending a hand to help Yeonjun up.

Yeonjun doesn’t take it. He stares at Beomgyu. “Really?”

“What, am I not allowed to have working eyes?” Beomgyu rolls his eyes. He takes Chaeryeong’s hand and dips her.

“You mean a working _dick_?” Chaeryeong giggles.

“Silence, virgin!” Beomgyu laughs, splashing her.

_Ok. It’s time to clock out._ Yeonjun leans back until his head dips below the surface.

“Captain!”

“Holy shit!”

“Yeonjun!”

“He’s dead!”

Yeonjun blows a stream of bubbles.

“Scratch that, he’s alive!”

Yeonjun lays there with his eyes shut, floating ever so slightly. The pond’s bright blue water is like a lukewarm embrace.

_Help us._

Yeonjun opens his eyes. All he can see is the blue glow.

He hears it again, or rather, he thinks it clear in his mind: _Help us._

Everything goes dark. Even the slight poke of the pebbles under him dims down to nothing.

_Help us._

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun wakes up. His back aches as he sits up, pebbles crunching under him.

The star is high in the sky, drowning him in sticky, humid heat.

He’s beside the pond, but it’s gone back to being clear water over mossy rocks.

He looks over at the opposite shore. Ryujin’s sprawled out like a starfish. Chaeryeong and Taehyun are curled up and on their sides, facing away from the water.

_Where’s Beomgyu?_

“So you’re awake.”

Yeonjun turns around to find Beomgyu standing in the forest path, carrying a bundle in his arms. Yeonjun rises to his feet, extending his arms to take the bundle from him. “I can-”

“Thanks, Cappy, but this is literally just toast.” Beomgyu steps carefully onto the pebbled shore, untying the blanket. “It’s an insult to your muscles.”

Yeonjun’s face gets warm. _Maybe I’ve got a sunburn._

“Before you say anything awkward and formal,” Beomgyu says, spreading the blanket out by the pond. “I don’t actually _like_ you.”

“But-”

“I sometimes get intrusive, horny thoughts when I look at you, nothing else.” Beomgyu cracks open the container that had been inside the bundle. The smell of freshly toasted bread wafts over to Yeonjun. Beomgyu smiles up at him. “We all get horny thoughts about colleagues we respect, right?”

“I don’t.” Yeonjun says.

“Good for you.” Beomgyu shakes the canteen that had also been inside the bundle. He twists the cap off. “Coffee?”

“Yes, please.” Yeonjun sits down on the blanket next to him. Then he reconsiders and inches away ever so slightly.

Beomgyu glares at him and holds the jug of coffee out of Yeonjun’s reach. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Don’t act weird around me.” Beomgyu takes a sip of the coffee. “I’m not going to do anything. I just think you’re hot. Be flattered, but that’s it.”

“Is there anything…I can do…” Yeonjun says slowly, trying to reach for the canteen. “To make it stop?”

Beomgyu laughs. “You deserve to be two hundredth rank _just_ for saying that.”

Yeonjun stops reaching for the coffee and scowls.

“Come on, lighten up, Cappy,” Beomgyu hands him the jug of coffee. “The ranks don’t matter anymore. We’re _done_.”

“We haven’t graduated yet.”

“This whole practicum thing is just a formality.” Beomgyu waves a hand dismissively. “It’s basically a vacation. Look where they sent us! Fucking _paradise_!”

Yeonjun looks around the dense, purple forest. The pond glimmers a little bit.

“We’re still on an uncharted planet. We can’t let our guard down.”

Beomgyu sighs as he picks up a piece of toast. “I liked you better last night.”

“Last night wasn’t me.” Yeonjun says.

Beomgyu shrugs. “Anyway, I like whoever that was better.”

A loud beep comes from Taehyun’s watch, still on the rock they’d left it on the night before.

Yeonjun frowns. A red light’s blinking from the watch.

“It’s probably low battery.” Beomgyu says, taking a bite of his toast. He holds the container out to Yeonjun. “You want some?”

Yeonjun takes a slice slowly. The red light keeps blinking, and the watch beeps again.

Taehyun shoots up like he’d been shocked. “Oh my god!”

Beomgyu laughs. “Hey Taehyun, you want some breakfast?”

Taehyun scrambles to get his watch. He types a few things. “The- It’s- _We’re back online_!”

Yeonjun nearly drops his toast. “What?”

Chaeryeong and Ryujin stir, rolling to face Taehyun. “What’s going on?” Chaeryeong mumbles.

“We have all the Academy’s transmissions!” Taehyun says excitedly, jumping around. Then he stops jumping. “And two, uh… SOS transmissions.”

“Whom from?” Yeonjun frowns.

“Uh, the first one’s from... _EXP Alpha._ ”

Yeonjun ignores the look Beomgyu gives him. “And the second?”

“It’s from _EXP Bravo._ ”

Chaeyreong sits up. “What did they say?”

“Play the transmission from the _Alpha_ first.” Yeonjun says, ignoring the look of betrayal Chaeryeong shoots him.

“Yes, Captain.” Taehyun turns the volume up, then hits play.

The entire clearing is treated to the loud crackling of static.

Taehyun quickly turns the volume down, just as someone speaks.

_“Yeonjun, I need_ -”

Static consumes the rest of the sentence.

Taehyun stops the transmission from replaying. “That’s it.”

Yeonjun frowns.

“Who was that even?” Ryujin frowns, her eyes still shut.

“Kim Soobin.” Yeonjun says.

Chaeryeong reaches out to tug on Taehyun’s pant leg. “Play the one from the _Bravo_.”

Taehyun looks to Yeonjun for approval.

He’s still frowning at the surface of the pond. _What the hell was Soobin trying to say?_

“Captain.” Beomgyu says sharply. “Can Taehyun play the transmission from Rank 2?”

Yeonjun blinks at him for a long moment. “I- Uh, yeah, I mean, yes. Go ahead, Taehyun.”

“Yes, Captain.” Taehyun flips to the next transmission and hits the play button.

_“This is Bang Chan, captain of the EXP Bravo._

_As of 30 minutes ago in our internal time, we lost our engine. We haven’t yet been able to find the cause, but it’s gone unusually cool. We are currently drifting – Jisung, could you please send the coordinates with the transmission.”_

_“Done.”_ Another voice says.

_“Thanks._ ” Chan takes a deep breath. _“We’re still trying to get our engine back up, but we’re beginning to drift far off course. We could be-_ ” Chan’s voice stutters. _“Please help us. Please.”_

There’s a loud click, and then silence.

“That’s it.” Taehyun says in a low voice.

Chaeryeong stands up. “Yeonjun, we have to-”

“Which transmission arrived first?” Yeonjun asks.

“The _Alpha_ ’s.” Taehyun says. “But-”

“Protocol says we should respond to the first one that arrived.” Yeonjun says. “We should-”

“They’re literally drifting in space!” Chaeryeong yells, storming across the pond. “We don’t even know how long ago that was sent-”

“Chaeryeong, wait,” Beomgyu says, catching her before she can hit Yeonjun. “We don’t even know if the ship can get off this planet yet.”

“Let’s find out.” Yeonjun says.

Chaeryeong starts running down the path before Yeonjun says anything else.

He turns back to the others. “Come on.”


	9. Protocol

“Beomgyu and Ryujin, I’m going to need a status update on the ship.” Yeonjun says as they run under the noontime heat towards the _Charlie_. “I need to know if we’re ready for interstellar travel.”

“Yessir.”

“Yes, Captain.”

“Taehyun, let’s try to contact both ships.” Yeonjun says. “See if we get an answer.”

“Yes, Captain.”

“What do I do?” Chaeryeong asks, catching up to Yeonjun. “I can’t just do _nothing_ -”

“I know.” Yeonjun says. “I’ll give you access to all our ship’s records and data. See if you can find out how Beomgyu was able to restart our engine.”

Chaeryeong’s entire face lights up. “So we’re going to help the _Bravo_?”

“I don’t know yet.” Yeonjun looks ahead to avoid Chaeryeong’s frown. “But if we do, I want to be prepared.”

Chaeryeong says nothing.

“Understood?”

“Yes.” Chaeryeong says, only adding as an afterthought, “Captain.”

The five of them sit around their dinner later that evening, looking down at their instant noodle cups like they’re expecting them to stay warm.

“If no one minds,” Yeonjun says, cutting into the silence. “We could just have the meeting now rather than later.”

The other four grunt in agreement, watching the steam from their soup fade to nothing.

“Taehyun-” Yeonjun notices how deep Taehyun’s frown is. “I’ll report for us. We’ve been trying to contact both the _EXP Alpha_ and the _EXP Bravo_ , but neither is replying. We contacted the Academy, and they’re dispatching help from the Fleet, but it might take over a week to arrive. We were urged to assist the other ships in any way we can.”

“They didn’t say which one to help first?” Chaeryeong asks.

“They did.” Taehyun says. “They said to follow protocol.”

“What do they even know?” Chaeryeong slams her spoon down.

“Chaeryeong, please.” Yeonjun turns to Beomgyu, who’s been stirring his soup with the wrong end of his spoon. “Beomgyu, report.”

“The engine, thrusters, warp generator – everything’s okay for interstellar travel except the ship’s exoskeleton.” Beomgyu mutters. “It could take a couple more weeks.”

“How many?” Chaeryeong asks.

“One or two?” Beomgyu sighs. “I don’t know. The climate here is all wrong for the bacteria. They can only work on the repairs at night.”

“Is there any way we can make them faster?” Chaeryeong asks. “Maybe we can make a shade for them-”

“I already thought about that, but it won’t decrease the temperature by enough.”

Yeonjun stops stirring his noodles absently. “Chaeryeong, report.”

“I think we should help the _EXP Bravo_.” Chaeryeong says firmly.

“That’s not…” Yeonjun sighs. “We can’t just choose to help the _Bravo_ because your boyfriend’s there.”

“Then we can’t help the _Alpha_ because _your_ boyfriend’s there.” Chaeryeong crosses her arms.

“He’s not my- The protocol is there for a reason, Chaeryeong.” Yeonjun says. “I’m only following-”

“You can’t just follow protocols blindly-”

“I’m _not_! I’m thinking about each and every one of us and the _future_. Did you even think of that?” Yeonjun stands up. “The Academy- No, the _Fleet_ is going to see a log of everywhere we go, everything we do, every single decision we make. And if we show them this early on that we don’t care for the protocols, why would they hire us? We would look like a risk to them. Then all of our hard work will be useless.”

Chaeryeong sinks in her seat. “I don’t care about all that.”

“You should.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun finds himself on the bridge of a much, much larger ship.

To be more specific, he’s in the captain’s seat of a much, much larger ship.

_Not again._

Yeonjun spins around. “Soobin?”

Soobin had been standing to one side, talking to someone in the navigator uniform. “I’m sorry, excuse me.”

“Soobin!” Yeonjun says, just as the high-pitched ringing erupts in his ears. He bends over in pain. _Not this shit again._

Soobin’s hands land on Yeonjun’s arms. “Are you all right? What’s wrong?”

Yeonjun screws his eyes shut, tears welling up in them from the effort of not just screaming right now.

“Yeonjun,” Soobin gently brushes the tears away. “What’s happening?”

“You fucking tell me!” Yeonjun says, shoving Soobin’s hands away from him. “Why would you send a transmission like that!”

Soobin’s starry eyes are wide in concern. “What transmission? What are you talking about?”

“Stop playing dumb, you fucking- I fucking hate you!” Yeonjun pushes Soobin away by the shoulders. “How are you still making my life miserable from _light-years away!_ ”

“What are you talking about?” Soobin asks, hurt creeping into his voice.

“It’s not important, is it? You’re just messing with me, right?” Yeonjun curls his hands into fists. “Well, you picked the wrong fucking time to do it!”

“Yeonjun, you’re scaring me.”

Yeonjun kicks his chair. Even in this stupid dream, Yeonjun can’t bring himself to hit Soobin.

“I should ignore your fucking transmission.” Yeonjun says. “We should go help the other ship.”

“What other ship?”

“As if you care.” Yeonjun shakes his head. “You don’t give a fuck about anyone but yourself.”

Soobin frowns. “I care about you.”

The darkness swallows them up.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Ryujin enters the bridge. Taehyun’s at his station, but he’s got his headphones on. _Good_.

She walks over to the captain’s chair, where Yeonjun’s been staring at his screen so hard that the veins in his eyes are starting to stand out a little.

_Maybe it’s a bad time._

“Captain?” Ryujin asks carefully.

Yeonjun blinks, rubbing his eyes. “Y- Yeah? Sorry.”

“I… Could I talk to you about something?”

“What?”

“I mean,” Ryujin tries to word things in her head, but her head’s never been the wordy type. “I wanted to talk to you about _the_ thing.”

Yeonjun blinks and rubs his eyes again. “Sorry, what?”

“We should go to the _Alpha_.” Ryujin says. “When the ship is ready to go, I mean.”

Yeonjun stares at her. “Since when did _you_ care about protocol?”

“It’s not the protocol-” Ryujin catches herself before she says anything incriminating. “I mean, it _is_ the protocol. Yes. We should follow the protocol.”

Yeonjun frowns at her for a very, very long time. “Is there… anything you want to tell me?”

“No.” Ryujin says with a nervous laugh. “But uh, yeah, we should help the _Alpha._ Please?”

“Ryujin-”

“Actually, forget I ever said anything. Bye.” Ryujin turns on one heel and darts out of the bridge before Yeonjun can say anything else.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“I’m not giving up on you,” Chaeryeong says, squinting in the bright lights from the dome above. “We’ll come get you, and then we’ll be together. I promise.”

Jeongin laughs at her. “What the hell are you talking about, Ryeongchae?”

Chaeryeong gives him a sad smile. “Just hang in there, please.”

“Are you drunk?” Jeongin laughs, walking his fingers up her waist to tickle her.

Chaeryeong’s usually ridiculously sensitive, but she doesn’t even flinch. “I know you can hear me.”

“Uh, loud and clear, yeah.”

Chaeryeong runs her hand along the edge of his face. “How long have you been calling for help?”

“Ryeongchae… _what_?”

Chaeryeong sighs. Then she tilts his face towards hers for a kiss. “I love you.”

“I lo- What’s _that_?”

“I love you so much, Jeongin.” Chaeryeong shuts her eyes as the darkness takes over.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Taehyun rubs his temples. He needs fresh air. He’s been trying to refine the _EXP Alpha_ ’s transmission for over a day now, the operating word here being “trying.”

“I’ll just go out and stretch my legs, Captain.” Taehyun says as he walks toward the bridge’s exit.

Yeonjun grunts in reply.

Taehyun sighs. Yeonjun’s not looking good. None of them have been the past day, but Yeonjun especially. _Because he has to make the hard decision._

_It’s not that hard a decision, really. The protocol made the decision for us. We just have to go with it, and no one can fault us for the outcome._

He steps out of the ship, taking a deep gulp of the slightly salty spray.

And something else that isn’t salty.

Taehyun grimaces as he gets showered with something that isn’t from the ocean. It smells sweet, like the hand-pulled candy he would get from his mom’s hometown.

“Drink it up, boys!” Beomgyu shouts, walking along the side of the ship in his full orange exosuit. He’s hosing the side of the ship down with a fine mist coming from a clear tank with some kind of colorless liquid.

“What are you doing?” Taehyun frowns, dodging the spray, which smells more than a little familiar. He frowns. “Is that _Fun Juice_?”

“The _funnest_.” Beomgyu growls, walking all around the ship (he’s switched the magnetized settings on his boots on), spraying every last inch with a fine mist of Fun Juice. “We are getting off this fucking planet _tonight_!”

Taehyun raises a finger in concern. “Is this ethical?”

“Oh, fuck ethics, we have a ship that needs rescuing.” Beomgyu tugs on the hose to roll the tank to the other side. “I don’t know how you’ve been able to live with Chaeryeong losing her damn mind over her boyfriend, but _I_ can’t.”

“We’re going to go to the _Alpha_ first, though.” Taehyun says.

Beomgyu shuts the hose off and stomps around the ship to frown at Taehyun. “Did Yeonjun say that? Is it final? Is he fucking _serious_ -”

“No, it’s not yet final.” Taehyun says. “But we have to follow the protocol.”

Beomgyu switches the hose on again. “Not you too.”

“There’s the least guilt involved if we just follow the protocol.” Taehyun says. “That’s why it exists.”

“No, no, no,” Beomgyu says, hosing the underside of the ship down, too. “It exists because people like to pretend they can be completely unbiased.”

“People _can_!”

“No. Look at Yeonjun.” Beomgyu says. “He’s acting like he’s being all fair and shit, but he’s really just hooked on what could just be a fucking booty call from Kim Soobin!”

Taehyun frowns. “You’re being too hard on him.”

“Well, yeah, _I_ never claimed to be impartial or whatever.” Beomgyu says, just as the hose begins to cough up nothing but air. “Dammit.”

“I can help you get more.” Taehyun says, taking the tank by the handle.

Beomgyu backflips off the ship and takes the tank from him. “No. Don’t you have your own job to do? Courtesy of our completely fair, unbiased captain?”

Taehyun sighs. “He’s doing his best, Beomgyu.”

“He can do better.”

“What, really?” Chaeryeong gasps, switching the induction stove off.

“Like, _now_?” Ryujin asks, getting out of her chair so quickly that it topples over.

“Yeah.” Beomgyu gives the girls a smug grin. “I know, I’m a living _god_ , where would you all be without me- Oh.”

He stops talking, because Chaeryeong’s just hugged him. Ryujin runs over and hugs him from the other side.

“What’s going on?” Yeonjun asks, barely stifling a yawn as he enters the common area.

“Beomgyu’s repaired the ship’s exterior.” Taehyun says from where he’s counting out enough plates and utensils for everyone.

Yeonjun takes a whole second to process that. “What? _Now_?”

“Yeah- I mean, yes, Captain.” Beomgyu says, straightening up as much as he can with the two girls hugging him. “I’ll check again after dinner, but we can leave as early as midnight.”

Yeonjun walks over, and Beomgyu tries taking an anxious step back, but he can’t.

Then Yeonjun puts his arms around Beomgyu, too. Around all three of them, actually. “You’re amazing, Beomgyu.”

Beomgyu’s entire face warms up. “I was just, uh, I was just doing my job.”

“Should we set a course for the _Alpha_ ’s last known location?” Ryujin asks.

Chaeryeong steps away from the others. “The _Alpha_? We’re going to the _Bravo_ , right, Yeonjun?”

“We’re following the protocol.” Taehyun says.

“Fuck the protocol.” Beomgyu says.

Yeonjun sinks into the nearest chair, rubbing his temples. “Guys, please.”

“Why do you care about the _Alpha_ all of a sudden?” Chaeryeong asks, poking Ryujin with one finger.

“Her ex is the first ranked pilot.” Beomgyu says.

Ryujin gasps. “How do you _know_ that?”

“Does _everyone_ on this ship make decisions based on their love lives?” Taehyun groans.

“There’s nothing wrong with wanting to protect people you care about!” Chaeryeong snaps at him. “Maybe if _you_ had people you actually cared for-”

“Whoa, whoa, Chaeryeong, you didn’t have to come for him like that.” Ryujin says, holding Chaeryeong back from snapping Taehyun in half.

“You shut up!” Chaeryeong says, shoving Ryujin’s arms away. “You’re still hung up on your ex-”

“Not everyone’s as lucky as you, check your fucking privilege-”

“Fuck you-”

“No, fuck _you_ -”

Yeonjun stands up scraping his chair loudly on the floor. The entire room falls silent.

“Beomgyu, do a check on the ship’s status after dinner. I want a full report on the exoskeleton.” Yeonjun says. “Taehyun and Ryujin, I’ve sent you a draft course that I charted. Correct it where necessary. Depending on Beomgyu’s report, we set out at 2300 internal time.”

“Where… are we going?” Chaeryeong asks quietly.

Yeonjun struggles to stifle a yawn. “The _EXP Bravo_ f-”

“Thank you.” Chaeryeong says. She reaches out and squeezes his hand. “Thank you, Yeonjun.”

“It’s not just for you. My friend needs help.” Yeonjun says. “I can’t just ignore him.”

“What about the _EXP_ _Alpha_?” Ryujin asks.

“Their last known location is further from us than the _Bravo_ ’s. We’ll go to them after we’ve helped the _Bravo_.” Yeonjun yawns, then rubs his eyes, the dark circles under them a deep, disconcerting purple. “We’re not leaving anyone out.”

Taehyun frowns. “But Captain-”

“My orders are final.” Yeonjun says. “Let’s have dinner. We’re going to have another long night.”


	10. We’re not dumb

Chaeryeong looks out through the ship’s windshield. The bright, headache-inducing colors of the warp tunnel remind her of the one time she’d tried going to a club. She hated it, like she knew she would, but Jeongin didn’t want her to knock it till she’d tried it.

_We’re almost there, Jeongin._ Her chest tightens as she sees the dark circle at the end of the tunnel, growing larger and larger as the ship inches closer. They’ve been in warp for forty minutes, which isn’t so bad, considering they had to sit through six days of warp to get to their planet in the first place.

_But every_ second _hurts now._ Chaeryeong grips her armrests. “How much longer, Taehyun?”

“Thirteen minutes.” Taehyun replies. “It’s only been five minutes since you last asked.”

“Let her be.” Yeonjun says. He hasn’t been able to sit still for the better part of the last hour, now hanging half-off the edge of his chair. “Beomgyu, how’s our warp generator holding up?”

“Not even breaking a sweat, Captain.” Beomgyu says, watching the meters all over his screen. He hasn’t opened a side tab since they took off.

“How much longer?” Ryujin asks.

“Twelve minutes.” Taehyun sighs. He opens a timer and flicks it to display over the ship’s entire windshield. “There.”

“Sorry.” Ryujin says, lowering her head in the bright glow from the timer’s numbers, which are each about as tall as she is.

_00:11:56_ , the timer reads, ticking down before them.

Chaeryeong doesn’t know how she’ll survive just _waiting_ for twelve minutes.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Holy shit.” Ryujin said, frowning as a trajectory mapped itself out on the hologram above Taehyun’s station.

“Indeed.” Taehyun agreed, reviewing the code that generated the map. 

Ryujin pointed at the white point on the map that represented the _EXP Bravo_ ’s last known location. “Wait, did he really…”

“…Mathematically predict where the _Bravo_ is based on its last known speed and direction?” Taehyun sat back in his seat. “Yes he did.”

Ryujin let out a whistle, lifting both eyebrows. She spun around when the door to the bridge slid open. “If you were a girl, Captain, I would’ve-”

“I accounted for the gravitation from the nearby objects.” Yeonjun said, leaning over Taehyun’s shoulder to point at something in the code. “Is it right?”

“Honestly, no idea.” Taehyun replied.

Yeonjun stared at him. “Didn’t you cover that in the Academy?”

“Our professor in Charting 300 didn’t teach.” Taehyun said. “Or finish the syllabus. Not even remotely.”

Yeonjun sighed. “Beomgyu, do you know-”

“Nope,” Beomgyu raised both hands in defeat. “You’re the only one on this ship who knows if that’s right.”

Yeonjun frowned. “I hope it is.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Exiting warp in two minutes.” Taehyun takes the timer down. The black circle up ahead takes up almost the entire windshield’s breadth now, with the multicolored walls of the warp tunnel fading out.

“Ryujin, prepare for manual steering.” Yeonjun says. “We’re exiting into an asteroid belt.”

“Yes, Captain.” Ryujin sits up in her chair, cracking her knuckles.

“Everyone, seatbelts-” Yeonjun stops midsentence. The other four look back at him worriedly. “Never mind, everyone’s still got them on.”

Chaeryeong tries to take a breath, but it feels like someone’s holding her chest down.

‘“Beomgyu, report.”

“Warp generator cooldown sequence starting uh, now.” Beomgyu says. The ship jerks like they’d just hit a wall of water. “Shit, should’ve started it earlier, sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Yeonjun says. “Everyone okay?”

The rest of the crew mumble affirmatives.

“Exiting warp now.” Taehyun announces.

The tunnel of light around the ship disappears in the blink of an eye. The ship glides forward into the relative darkness.

“Ryujin-” Beomgyu starts.

“Got it.” Ryujin grips the controls on her dashboard, which are shaped like two half-circles.

Yeonjun squeezes his eyes shut for a few seconds to force himself to adjust to the lower light.

When he opens them, all he sees are the vague outlines like the lining on storm clouds. He realizes they’re the asteroids in the belt as Ryujin starts maneuvering the ship around them. They skim just around the edge of a large one, coming into a clearing lit by the distant star.

The light is hazy, but bright enough to wash over a cluster of the dull, lumpy asteroids.

Something glints just up ahead, sandwiched between two asteroids. It’s short and round, shaped vaguely like a bubble goldfish, and made of a smooth white material like a featureless moon.

It looks exactly like their ship.

“It’s them.” Ryujin says.

Yeonjun sits up in his chair. “Taehyun, uh- Secure line. I mean, establish a secure line.”

“Already on it, Captain.” Taehyun says, sending out a request to the other ship. “Oh.”

“Why?” Yeonjun asks.

“We’re uh, unable to connect to their ship.” Taehyun says. “No response.”

Yeonjun frowns. “Beomgyu, prepare a towing field.”

“Yes, Captain.”

“Ryujin, slow down.” Yeonjun says.

Ryujin gently presses on the brakes. “Done.”

The _Charlie_ slows down to a directed drift towards the other ship. It becomes evident that the other ship is _completely_ stationary, which makes Yeonjun only frown more.

“They’re using their thrusters to stay still.” Ryujin says. “They’re doing it manually.”

Yeonjun clutches one armrest. “Taehyun, try again.”

“I’ve been trying, Captain. Our request is sending, though I’m not sure it’s being received.”

“Ryujin, slow our approach.”

“Yes, Captain.” Ryujin says, pressing just a little harder on the brakes. “Can I ask why, though?”

Chaeryeong shifts in her seat, squinting at the other ship’s bridge, now only a few hundred kilometers away. “Can we zoom in?”

Beomgyu opens an inset window on their windshield’s screen, zooming in on the other ship from his station.

The other ship has a privacy filter over their windshield, blocking anyone from looking in. But the lettering embossed into its side is coming into view as the ship turns ever so slightly away from the _Charlie_.

“Wait.” Beomgyu says.

He zooms in again, tapping on his armrest while the image goes from blocky pixels to a defined image.

_E.X.P. ALPHA_

Chaeryeong unclips her belt and stands up, turning to Yeonjun. “You said we’d go to the _Bravo_ first.”

Yeonjun’s just staring at the letters on the screen. “I know… I did…”

“Then why-”

“I don’t know!” Yeonjun frantically opens all the data he’d used to chart their flight path.

“Then why is it _them_!” Chaeryeong points at the screen. “You _promised_ we would-”

Ryujin doesn’t wait for Yeonjun’s orders. She presses all the way down on the brakes, making Chaeryeong stumble towards the windshield. “The captain’s path was right. He used the _Bravo_ ’s last known loca-”

“Then _where are they?_!” Chaeryeong cries, throwing another hand at their windshield. “Why the fuck are _they_ the ones here!”

“Chaeryeong,” Beomgyu unclips his seatbelt. “Calm down-”

“How can you expect me to do that when all this time I thought we were going to rescue-”

“Ryujin, continue towards the _Alpha_.” Yeonjun says, closing all of his tabs.

“But we haven’t talked to them.” Ryujin says, looking at Taehyun.

“We _can’_ t.” Taehyun says. “Something’s interfering with-”

“Ryujin, move the ship closer to the _Alpha_.” Yeonjun says. “Make sure our window’s aligned with theirs. Beomgyu, turn the privacy filter off.”

No one moves. The entire bridge is silent save for Chaeryeong’s ragged breathing.

“Ryujin, Beomgyu, those were orders.” Yeonjun says.

“Something’s not right, Captain.” Ryujin says.

“Just do it.” Yeonjun tries to swallow but his throat is dry. “Trust me.”

Beomgyu ignores him and walks over to Chaeryeong, putting his arms around her. “It’s okay, we’re going to find him. It’s okay.”

Yeonjun unclips his seatbelts and steps off his low dais. “Beomgyu, lower the privacy filter.” He says, extending an arm to take Chaeryeong from him.

“Y- Yes, Captain.”

“Ryujin, move us within their view.”

Ryujin closes her hands around the controls, using the ship’s thrusters to drive it around to face the other ship. They’re close enough now to make out the seams in the ship’s exterior.

Beomgyu lowers their privacy filter.

Yeonjun helps Chaeryeong back into her seat before walking right in front of the windshield.

The other ship’s privacy filter remains up, giving them nothing but a view of their own ship in its warped reflection.

“What now, Captain?” Taehyun asks.

Yeonjun folds his arms. “They can’t be _that_ stupid.”

“Their pilot isn’t.” Ryujin mutters.

“No one on that ship is stupid.” Beomgyu says. “They’re all rank 1.”

Yeonjun takes a deep breath. He shuts his eyes. _Kim Soobin, if you don’t-_

Their reflection in the other ship’s windshield fades, revealing the dimly lit bridge behind the glass.

The _Alpha_ ’s crew are all in their chairs, except their captain, who’s standing in front of their window.

Yeonjun clenches his jaw. He’d thought he would be relieved to see someone other than the crew of the _Charlie_ after these past two weeks, but it just _had_ to be Soobin.

Soobin turns to their navigator, a girl with long, jet-black hair.

A second later, a message flashes on their windshield in large red letters: _COMMS ARE DOWN._

Yeonjun rolls his eyes. He turns to Taehyun, who’s already hitting the enter key.

_WE KNOW,_ their own windshield reads in big, redder text. _WE’RE NOT DUMB._

Yeonjun can’t decide whether he should tell Taehyun off for that or not. “Taehyun, see if you can establish a crude radio-”

The Alpha’s screen clears. Soobin and the others seem to be arguing, and their navigator shakes her head so hard they can see it from this far away.

Soobin says something else to her.

She turns away and starts typing.

A few seconds later, a new message appears on their windshield. _LET’S LINK SHIPS._

“Without a comms connection?” Beomgyu groans. He turns to Yeonjun. “Don’t say yes.”

“Of course I won’t. We don’t need to do all that. Taehyun,” Yeonjun says. “Tell them to just secure a crude radio connection.”

Taehyun’s still typing when the _Alpha_ ’s windshield changes message again. _WE NEED TO TALK IN PERSON._

Taehyun stops typing and looks to Yeonjun. “What do I say, Captain?”

Yeonjun rolls his eyes. Then he looks at Chaeryeong, who’s just sitting in her chair and looking dead ahead. “Fine.”

“What?” Ryujin asks, swiveling around in her chair. “ _Seriously_?”

“Captain, I don’t know if you know how _hard_ it is to dock two of these microship models together when we _have_ working comms.” Beomgyu says.

“It’s fucking impossible without.” Ryujin says.

“Taehyun, tell them to begin physical link-up procedure in T minus 5 minutes.” Yeonjun says, turning to walk back to his chair.

Beomgyu groans. “Captain, _no_ -”

“Taehyun, send it now.” Yeonjun says tensely. “Beomgyu, Ryujin, prepare for physical link-up.”

_BEGIN LINK IN T-5 MIN._

Beomgyu slumps in his seat, crossing his arms. “Goddamn it.”

“Beomgyu, run the pre-link protocol.” Yeonjun says.

“No.”

“That was an order, not a suggestion.”

“It’s still a no,” Beomgyu sneers. “ _Sir_.”

“Captain, we shouldn’t attempt a maneuver like this without comms.” Ryujin says, turning to face him. “We can’t just _guess_ what the other-”

“I can drive if you don’t feel confident doing it.” Yeonjun says.

Ryujin glares at him. “First of all, fuck you. I can do it with my eyes closed.”

“I’d rather you did it with your eyes open, thank you.” Yeonjun says.

Ryujin flips him off before settling into her seat, flexing her fingers over the controls. “Fucking bitch.”

Yeonjun secures the last clasp of his exosuit’s helmet. He puts one hand on the hatch handle. Just beyond this door is an anteroom of sorts, which has another door on the other end. The other ship, which they’ve just aligned and connected to, has an identical anteroom with an identical door at its end.

It’s the space between the two doors that worries Yeonjun.

“Beomgyu, is the connection secured?” Yeonjun asks over the comms.

He gets nothing but angry breathing in return.

“Beomgyu.”

“Yes, it is.” Taehyun replies over his own mic.

“Thank you. I’m going now.” Yeonjun opens the hatch handle.

“Get fucked.” Beomgyu mutters.

Yeonjun sighs as he closes the first hatch behind him. There’s a loud noise followed by complete silence as the air leaves the room. Yeonjun’s feet lift off the floor as the artificial gravity dies down below him. He takes a deep breath of the odorless air cycling through his suit. He uses rails along the wall to bring him to the second hatch. He rests a hand hesitantly on the second hatch handle. “This isn’t going to kill me, is it?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if it does.” Beomgyu says.

Yeonjun takes his hand off the handle. “Beomgyu, we’re all trying to make the best of a difficult situation here.”

“And who put us in this difficult situation in the first place?”

Yeonjun grabs the handle. “If I fucking die, you are the first person I’m going to haunt.”

“Wow. Thanks. Looking forward to it, Captain.”

Yeonjun turns the handle.

He enters the actual connection between the two ships, which are two half-tubes so badly misaligned that they’d had to mute about a hundred alarms just to let the hatches on either side open. The darkness outside peeks in through chinks and gaps in the offset teeth of the two ships’ half-tubes.

Yeonjun’s entire body shakes, not from the cold, because the exosuit keeps him at a comfortably cool temperature, but from the knowledge that pretty much nothing is separating him from the vacuum of space just past the gaps. He reaches for the railing on the wall and tugs himself hard enough to propel him over the gap. There’s a spine-chilling groan from both ships, and a cracking noise where one of the ships’ half-tubes overlaps with the other.

He grabs onto the handle of the opposite hatch, tugging it open as soon as he does.

He locks himself in the _Alpha_ ’s anteroom just as a loud creak sounds out behind him. _That had better not be the ship disengaging._

_They had_ better _not have left me here._

_Ryujin, please_ -

The hatch in front of Yeonjun opens. The girl who’d opened it holds the door open for Yeonjun, staring at him with this cold, blank expression that reminds him of his grandma’s cat back home.

Yeonjun gives her a curt bow of thanks, closing the hatch behind them both.

The girl types something into the wall. Yeonjun feels air rush in from vents on either side of him. Then he feels gravity start to tug him downward. He hangs onto a railing on the wall to steady himself as his feet touch the floor.

The girl takes her helmet and half of her exosuit off. She pulls up a hologram display above her watch. “ID code, Captain Choi?”

Yeonjun hadn’t wanted to take his helmet off until they actually entered the ship itself, but there’s no way for him to reply otherwise. He removes his helmet. “3026-9317-CYJ.”

“Hm.” The girl swipes one finger over the hologram display, each stroke of her finger recorded in hovering blue brushstrokes in the air. Yeonjun’s never seen anyone type like that before. He can’t look away.

“Okay. You’re enrolled on the comms.” She turns to the door into the ship. “Captain, do I take him to the bridge?”

“Yes, please, Ms. Choi.”

Yeonjun frowns, not at Soobin’s voice in his earpiece, but at the fact that he’s actually calling someone their age _Ms. Choi._

“You can leave your exosuit here.” The girl says, already shedding her own exosuit. She’s wearing the lavender uniform of the navigations/communications program, but as she kicks off the legs of the exosuit, it becomes clear that her jacket is actually a skirt that reaches halfway to her knees, and she’s got leggings underneath that are tucked into knee-high white boots.

Yeonjun hangs his exosuit next to hers. He knows some people in the Academy choose to wear skirts for their uniform, but he just can’t imagine _why_ you would.

He follows “Ms. Choi” up the spiral stairs to their bridge. She brushes her finger against the scanner by the door.

A faint beep lets her know it’s been unlocked, and only then does she slide it open.

Yeonjun couldn’t even get _Taehyun_ to follow the biometric scanner protocol, so they’d just left the bridge’s door unlocked at all times. Which Yeonjun hated, of course.

“Captain Kim,” Ms. Choi enters the _Alpha_ ’s bridge with a sharp salute. “The _EXP_ _Charlie_ ’s captain is here.”

Soobin salutes her back. Then he grins at Yeonjun, his eyes sparkling like he’s thinking of something mean but keeping it to himself.

“Took you long enough.”


	11. Actual Protocol

“Took you long enough.”

“You’re lucky our pilot didn’t hear that.” Yeonjun says. “She’d probably have stabbed you by now.”

The _Alpha_ ’s pilot snickers from where she’s struggling to keep the two ships aligned by carefully tapping on each of the thrusters. She tries to disguise it as a dry cough.

“Pilot Hwang.” Soobin says, frowning at her.

“Sorry, sir.”

Yeonjun’s eyebrows shoot up. _It’s not just their navigator. Are they all this formal?_

_Why do you find it weird, Yeonjun? This is the way it’s supposed to be._

_Your crewmates have corrupted you._

_Speaking of which,_ Yeonjun pulls a data fob out of his pocket, holding it out to the other captain. “My team is going to need all the data you have on the _EXP Bravo_.”

Their navigator frowns at Soobin, who rolls his eyes. “I said we have to _talk_ about it.”

“I don’t need to. Just give us your data on the _Bravo_ -”

“Why didn’t you respond to our SOS?” Soobin asks.

“Something’s been interfering with our comms.” Yeonjun says. “Like now.”

Soobin looks at the data fob but doesn’t take it. “So how did you receive our transmission in the first place?”

“We were back online for a short window three days ago.” Yeonjun says. “We received both your ship’s and the _Bravo_ ’s transmissions then.”

Soobin stares at him then. “ _Three_ days ago?”

“Yes.”

“But we sent our transmission out…” Soobin looks to their navigator. “Ms. Choi?”

“Five days ago.” The navigator replies. “We received the _Bravo’_ s distress call twelve days ago, internal time.”

The hand holding the data fob out trembles. _But we got their transmission first. We got…_ Yeonjun tries to keep his voice steady as he says, “How long have you been looking for them?”

“Eleven days.” Soobin replies. “It took us almost a day to warp to their last known location.”

Yeonjun’s head is spinning. He staggers backward. “So you’ve been looking for them for _eleven_ days? And you haven’t found them yet?”

“No.” Soobin’s shoulders sag just a little bit. “That’s why we called you for help.”

Yeonjun finds himself leaning on the back wall of the _Alpha_ ’s bridge for support. He doesn’t know what to think. All he can think of is Chan. _Stupid, sleepy Chan. Never waking up to his alarms._

Yeonjun’s knees crumple.

_What the hell happened, Chan?_

“Doctor Jung,” Soobin calls to their medical officer, who’s already rushing to his side. “Please bring him downstairs to rest. He doesn’t look well.”

The medical officer reaches out to Yeonjun, who pushes his hands away.

“I’m fine.” Yeonjun straightens up, frowning. “I need all the data you have from when you received the _Bravo_ ’s signal. My crew and I will figure it out.”

“If we work toge-”

There’s a loud bang from the lower deck as the entire ship lurches forward. Yeonjun holds himself steady, reaching out to catch the nearest person on instinct.

It’s Soobin.

Yeonjun lets him go, feeling nothing as the other captain falls to the floor.

“What the hell was that?” Soobin asks, scrambling to his feet. “Engineer Shin, report.”

“Uh.” The _Alpha_ ’s engineer’s huge eyes bug out at her screen. “It looks like… they managed to… secure the link? The two ships are securely docked.”

“ _How_?” Soobin asks.

“Sheer dumb luck, Captain Kim.” The _Alpha_ ’s pilot says, taking her hands off the controls for first time in over an hour. She reclines in her seat with a funny little grin on her face. “Sheer dumb luck.”

“Uh, Captain?” The navigator makes a face at Soobin. “They’re uh… _everyone’s_ coming over, sir.”

“What do you mean, _everyone_?”

The common area seems that much smaller with ten people standing around the table, staring at each other in tense silence.

Soobin clears his throat. He pulls out one of the chairs. “You can sit down, you know.”

“We’ve been sitting down for an hour.” Yeonjun crosses his arms. “We’ll stand.”

“What happened to the _Bravo_?” Chaeryeong asks in a shaky, but loud voice.

Everyone turns to her. Then the crew of the _Alpha_ look back at Soobin.

“We’re- We’re not sure.” Soobin says.

“Then tell us everything you know!” Chaeryeong snaps at him.

“He’s a captain.” The _Alpha_ ’s pilot says. “Remember your rank.”

“You’re just a pilot.” Beomgyu says to her. “Shut up.”

“Beomgyu.” Yeonjun and Ryujin say at once, before frowning at each other.

“Everyone, stay calm.” Soobin says. He turns to their navigator. “Ms. Choi, please report the timeline of transmissions we received and sent.”

“Yes, sir.” The _Alpha_ ’s navigator pulls up a hologram from her watch. It’s much clearer than Taheyun’s and doesn’t have that awkward bright glow at the edges of the frame like his does. “Two days into the expedition, internal time, we received an SOS call from the _EXP_ _Bravo_ -”

“ _Two_ days?” Chaeryeong says. “That can’t be, I called them-”

“Chaeryeong,” Yeonjun says gently, ignoring the irritated looks from the _Alpha_ ’s crew. “Let’s hear them out first.”

Chaeryeong crosses her arms but says nothing.

“As I was saying,” The _Alpha_ ’s navigator continues after clearing her throat pointedly. “We received this SOS call from the _EXP Bravo_.”

She pulls out a file and presses the play button.

_“This is Bang Chan, captain of the EXP Bravo.”_

Yeonjun feels Chaeryeong’s body tense up next to him. He puts an arm around her shoulders.

_“As of 30 minutes ago in our internal time, we lost our engine. We haven’t yet been able to find the cause, but it’s gone unusually cool. We are currently drifting – Jisung, could you please send the coordinates with the transmission.”_

_“Done.”_ Another voice says.

_“Thanks._ ” Chan takes a deep breath.

Ryujin, Beomgyu, and Taehyun are staring at Yeonjun now. All Yeonjun can think is that he doesn’t want to hear Bang Chan begging again.

“That’s quite enough, thank you.” Yeonjun says sharply.

_“We’re still trying to get our engine back up, but-_ ”

“Stop the transmission, Ms. Choi.” Soobin says.

The _Alpha_ ’s navigator looks startled, but hits the stop button anyway. “There’s a few more seconds left in the recording, though.”

“We know.” Taehyun says. “We received the same transmission three days ago, internal time.”

“Well, uh, um,” The _Alpha_ ’s navigator looks flustered. “We set course immediately for the coordinates of the transmission, and sent out one of our own to let the _Bravo_ know that we were en route. It took us one day to arrive to the location they sent the transmission from-”

“You didn’t factor in the fact that they were, I dunno, a _moving_ _target_?” Ryujin makes a face.

“No, we didn’t.” The _Alpha_ ’s pilot replies tensely. “We prioritized getting there as soon as possible.”

“You probably should’ve.” Ryujin says.

Yeonjun reaches out and pulls Ryujin behind him before she can piss the other pilot off more. “What did you see when you got there?”

“Nothing.” Soobin replies. “We calculated for the possible trajectory of the ship – please show them, Ms. Choi – and we searched the area for the next couple of days. After a week, we sent an SOS transmission to your ship.”

Their navigator pulls up a 3D map of the nearby area. From their calculations, the _Bravo_ passed between two planets in a nearby star system before exiting the star system.

“It was, uh… _jungled_.” Taehyun says.

“Pardon?” Soobin frowns at him.

“The message you sent was messed up.” Beomgyu says. “None of the words made it.”

“Oh.” Soobin turns to his navigator, who shrugs.

“This doesn’t make any sense.” Yeonjun frowns, pointing at the larger of the two planets. “The mass of this planet would have brought them into a slingshot.”

“Our engineer realized that, and factored the gravitational effects into the ship’s plotted trajectory.” Soobin says. “We followed the new trajectory here.”

“I guess you guys figured it out faster,” The _Alpha_ ’s engineer says, with just the tiniest bitter lilt in her voice. “Considering you’re here, too.”

“Then where are they?” Chaeryeong asks. “Entire ships can’t just _disappear_!”

Soobin frowns at her like she’s a nuisance. “We know that. Which is why we need to work together to find the _Bravo_ instead of just standing around here arguing about it.”

“You can _try_ being a little bit sensitive about it, Soobin.” Yeonjun says. “Her boyfriend’s on that ship.”

“Oh. Jeongin.” The _Alpha’_ s medical officer gasps. “I’m so sorry, Chaeryeong.”

“What’re you sorry about?” Chaeryeong says, blinking hard as she shakes Yeonjun’s arm off her shoulder. “They’re not- They’re just out there, and we have to find them!”

Yeonjun clears his throat, drawing the frowns of the _Alpha_ ’s crew away from Chaeryeong. He holds up the data fob. “We’ll need all the data you have from the past week. Then we’ll return to our ship and not bother you again.”

Soobin sighs. “We need to work toge -”

“Do you think that’s actually going to happen?” Yeonjun scowls. “Taehyun, give them a copy of our data as well.”

“Yes, Captain.” Taehyun reaches into his pocket and pulls out a data fob. “I’ve already prepared it.”

The _Alpha_ ’s pilot glares right at Yeonjun. “We’re going to waste time if we work separately.”

“No, I think we’ll waste _more_ time trying to work together.” Beomgyu says. “Right, Ryujin?”

Ryujin shoots him a dirty look.

Yeonjun puts the data fob on the table. “I’ll be back for this later. Let’s go, guys.”

“Wait,” Soobin says, but the crew of the _Charlie_ have already turned for the ship’s exit. “Goddamn it.”

Taehyun looks away from his station for the first time in hours. “Captain, can you please stop that? Please?”

Yeonjun stops midstep. He’s been pacing around the bridge for the past few hours. “Sorry.”

“I’m sorry, too, but you’re making it hard to think.” Taehyun rubs his temples.

“Is there anything we can do to help?” Chaeryeong asks, from where she’s given Ryujin her fifth checkup in the same day.

“ _Please_?” Ryujin says, trying the shake off the medical equipment clipped to her.

“I just don’t understand why we got the _Alpha_ ’s transmission before the _Bravo_ ’s.” Taehyun shakes his head in frustration. “It’s driving me _mad_.”

“Isn’t it because the comms were down?” Yeonjun asks. “We received all the transmissions at once.”

“Maybe the computer messed up the order.” Beomgyu offers.

“No, there’s…” Taehyun shakes his head again, unable to put it into words. He lets out an exasperated groan.

“Let’s give the guy some space.” Beomgyu suggests. He nods at Chaeryeong and Ryujin as he takes Yeonjun by the arm. “Come on, everyone.”

Beomgyu places four mugs of tea down on the table, but none of the three seated around the table reach out for any of them. He sighs. “I’ll bring this up to Taehyun.”

“No, I’ll do it.” Ryujin offers. “I’ve been sitting _all_ day and I can’t fucking take it anymore.”

“Okay.” Beomgyu holds the fifth mug out to her. “Just don’t make any noise, he might snap and murder you at this rate.”

“Yup. I’ll be a Quiet Ryujin.” Ryujin pretends to zip her lips shut as she takes the mug.

Beomgyu sincerely doubts that, but any reason for him not to climb the stairs again is welcome. He turns back to Chaeryeong and Yeonjun. Chaeryeong’s just sitting there, staring at the steam coming off the four mugs, while Yeonjun’s gotten out of his chair and started pacing again.

Beomgyu catches the captain with one hand. “Sit.”

“I can’t-”

“Sit down.” Beomgyu says. “That’s an order.”

“You’re our engineer, you can’t-”

“Choi Yeonjun, sit down and drink your tea or I will _make_ you. And you don’t want that.” Beomgyu says.

Yeonjun lowers himself slowly into one of the chairs and reaches for a mug.

“Good.” Beomgyu sits down and gets a mug of his own.

“Do you want a check-up?” Chaeryeong offers.

“No thanks,” Beomgyu replies. “Three is plenty for one day.”

“Okay.” Chaeryeong lowers her head.

“They’ve got to be keeping something from us.” Yeonjun says suddenly. “There’s no way they were searching _thoroughly_ for over a week and they found nothing.”

Beomgyu lowers his mug to frown at their captain. “I don’t think they would _deliberately_ mess up the search. They have nothing to gain from it.”

“They’re already first rank.” Chaeryeong mumbles.

“It just doesn’t make any sense.” Yeonjun says. “Our scanners can search entire star systems. We’ve _already_ searched this entire star system, _twice_. There’s no way to hide-”

“Why would the _Bravo_ be hiding?” Chaeryeong says defensively. “ _They_ don’t have anything to gain from that.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean it that way.” Yeonjun says.

“I get what you mean.” Beomgyu says. “Our technology doesn’t leave anything a secret.”

Yeonjun frowns at Beomgyu. “Especially not from you.”

“Look, I’m sorry for telling everyone… Kim Soobin’s shit, I see that now,” Beomgyu says. “I’ll never tease you about him again.”

“Thank you.”

Chaeryeong’s blowing the steam off her tea when she stops suddenly. “Ryujin’s taking a long time, isn’t she?”

“Oh shit.” Beomgyu groans. “She’s probably bothering Taehyun.”

“I’ll take care of it.” Yeonjun says.

Yeonjun steps into the bridge. “Shin Ryujin, leave the man to work-”

Taehyun turns to Yeonjun, rubbing his eyes. “What?”

Yeonjun stops and looks around. “W- Where is Ryujin?”

“She’s not here.” Taehyun says. He holds up his mug. “She gave me some tea and left.”

Yeonjun stares at him.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Ryujin tiptoed down the stairs to the engine room. She peeked inside first, even though she knew for a fact that Beomgyu was upstairs having tea with the others. _Just gotta be sure. You never know with slimy people like Beomgyu._

She tapped along the paneling of the engine room, tiptoeing to reach the higher panels.

_Tonk tonk!_ One of the panels made a hollow sound.

She stopped and pressed on the panel, which popped out like the shelving in the kitchen.

Ryujin pulled out something wrapped in rough black cloth. She folded some of the cloth away to check on the clear plastic container inside.

_Okay, still good._

Ryujin checked over her shoulder, just a little bit distracted by how bright her exosuit was. _Coast is clear._

She opened the hatchet to the ship’s anteroom.

“Where are you going?” Taehyun’s voice seemed to echo in her skull.

“God, jeez, holy shit,” Ryujin gasped, pressing herself against the walls.

“Where are you going?” Taehyun asked again, his diction so eerily similar that it sounded like a recording.

“Out.” Ryujin replied.

“Does the captain know?”

“No, and don’t tell on me,” Ryujin said. “Just focus on your work, I’m not doing anything bad.”

Taehyun’s end went silent.

_Dammit._

Ryujin tucked the bundle under her arm and opened the next hatchet. _Damn Taehyun that little snitch-_

She scrambled across the connection between the two ships to the _Alpha_ ’s anteroom.

_Hah. They can’t stop me now._

Ryujin opened the _Alpha’_ s door and entered the room. She didn’t waste any time crossing it to open the door into the other ship.

Only to find herself facing a stun gun.

“Holy _shit_ what the _fuck_!” Ryujin crumpled to the floor, raising both arms. “Why the fuck are you waving that around? Who _else_ could be boarding your ship?”

The _Alpha’_ s pilot only lowered the stun gun to point it at Ryujin’s chest. “What are you doing here?”

“Put down the gun, Yeji!”

“No!” Yeji snapped back, steadily pointing the gun at Ryujin. “What are you doing here?”

“It’s just me!” Ryujin wiggled her hands, which were still raised in the air. “Put the damn gun away-”

“What’s this?” Yeji used one boot to poke at the black bundle Ryujin had dropped.

“It’s-” Ryujin blushed, lowering her head in the hopes that Yeji wouldn’t notice. “They’re madeleines. Your favorite, right?”

Yeji lowered the stun gun, flicking the safety switch back on as she did. “Shin Ryujin, we’re in the middle of searching for missing colleagues-”

“I know! I made them weeks ago!” Ryujin picked up the bundle and unwrapped it, holding the clear plastic container inside out to Yeji. “I was gonna give it to you before you left but you guys took off early and-”

Yeji stared at the container like she was considering pointing the gun at it instead. “You only made _five_?”

“No, it was three dozens. But I got hungry.” Ryujin admitted, scratching her head. “And I didn’t know if I would see you again before they got stale-”

“Just finish them all, I don’t want them.” Yeji heaved a sigh, crossing her arms. “No offense, I’m sure they’re good. You’re a good baker.”

“I _did_ make them for you,” Ryujin said, holding the container out some more. “So uh, you should just take them.”

“Ryujin, I don’t want to, and you know why-”

“What’s going on here?”

Yeji turned to her captain with a panicked salute. “Nothing, sir.”

Soobin lifted both eyebrows but said nothing. He gave Ryujin a curious look. “You must be the _Charlie_ ’s pilot.”

“Uh, yeah, _duh_ , who else could I be?” Ryujin said, pinching the powder blue jacket of her uniform. She noticed the angrier-than-usual look from Yeji, and decided to add a quick, “ _Sir_.”

“Captain, this is Pilot Shin Ryujin,” Yeji said, making a sharp gesture in Ryujin’s direction. “Ryujin, this is our Captain Kim Soobin, the son of the _General_.” She added, with extra emphasis on that last bit.

“Oh crap, right.” Ryujin blushed. “Sorry, Captain, sir.”

“Uh, you can call me Soobin, I don’t care.” Soobin said, clearly looking more uncomfortable than Ryujin. He looked at the door to the anteroom then. “Just a question, why haven’t you disengaged the link yet? I thought Yeon- I thought you said you would.”

“Oh, Yeonjun said to leave it until we had to actually go somewhere,” Ryujin shrugged. “’Cause we might need something from you guys or the other way around, and it would’ve been a waste of all my hard work getting the thing to lock in the first place-”

“ _Hard work_?” Yeji shook her head. “You were just lucky.”

“It was _hard_!” Ryujin said, glaring at her. “I doubt even you would get it right on the first try.”

“I’m sure it was difficult, Pilot Shin.” Soobin said, giving Yeji a stern look before looking back at Ryujin. “So how’s the work coming along on your side?”

“Oh, everyone’s losing their goddamn minds.” Ryujin said casually.

Soobin looked troubled, but Yeji said, “She just means they haven’t gotten anywhere. Ryujin has a bad habit of exaggerating.”

“Oh. Okay.” Soobin nodded slowly. Then he noticed the container Ryujin was holding. “What’s that?”

“Uh…” Ryujin considered throwing the box across the room, but it was too late for evasive maneuvers. “Madeleines. I made them.”

“Ooh.” Soobin’s face lit up. “Could I have one?”

“Captain, we need to focus on the task at hand.” Yeji said with a disapproving frown.

“We _have_ been focusing on the task at hand for days now,” Soobin replied. “Surely I’m entitled to _one_ piece of bread.”

“It’s actually more of a biscuit.” Yeji and Ryujin said at once.

Yeji shot an irritated look at Ryujin, who just handed the box to the other ship’s captain. “Here, you can have everything.”

“Really? Oh wow, thank you,” Soobin said, cradling the container of madeleines in his arms like a newborn child. “I’ll share it with the others. Do you want one, Ye- I mean, Pilot Hwang?”

Yeji glared at him like she was ready to commit murder. “No.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun opens the door to the _EXP Alpha_ , but no one comes to greet him. He frowns. _Surely they haven’t let their guard down_ that _much._

_We could be up to anything. We have everything to gain from taking them out._

Yeonjun shudders at himself. _Why would you even think that?_

“Where the fuck are they?” Beomgyu says, coming through the doorway behind him. “We could be stealing all their shit-”

“They know we won’t.” Chaeryeong says, pushing the door open for herself and Taehyun.

“They might be interrogating Ryujin.” Taehyun says.

Yeonjun shakes his head. “That doesn’t seem like their style. It’s not protocol.”

They creep up the stairs to the _Alpha_ ’s common area to find all of the ship’s crew and Ryujin sitting around the table dipping biscuits into mugs of coffee. Only the _Alpha’_ s pilot is standing off to one side, not eating.

“The crew of the _Bravo_ could be in real danger,” Yeonjun growls. “And you’re all having a goddamn _snack_?”

“Oh shit.” Ryujin covers her mouth with one hand to keep the crumbs from spraying out while she stands and salutes Yeonjun. “Sorry, Captain, it’s my fault.”

“Why am I not surprised?” Yeonjun glares at her.

“We’re just taking a break,” Soobin says. “You should take one, too.”

“Absolutely not.” Chaeryeong says before Yeonjun can even open his mouth. “We need to keep working until we find out where the _Bravo_ is and get there.”

The _Alpha_ ’s engineer takes a bite of her biscuit. “That won’t happen if we’re all burned out. You need to chill.”

Chaeryeong slaps the biscuit clean out of her hands. “Listen here you little _bitch_ -”

“Chaeryeong,” Yeonjun says, as he and Beomgyu reach out to pull her back. “I’m sorry about my medic’s reaction, but-”

“What happened to ‘ _do_ _no harm’_?” The _Alpha_ ’s engineer makes a face.

The _Alpha_ ’s medical officer silently bends over to pick up their engineer’s biscuit off the floor.

“Shut up, Yuna, you piece of shit, you don’t know anything.” Beomgyu snaps at her. “Stay in your fucking lane.”

“ _I_ don’t know anything?” Yuna scoffs. “You’re the one who fucked your way to the top-”

“Fuck you, you couldn’t do that even if you _tried_ -”

“Engineer, please watch your language.” Yeji snaps.

“Say that to your own fucking engineer!” Ryujin snaps at her.

“I _was_ , you idiot!”

“Hey.” Taehyun says, pointing at Yeji. “Don’t call her that.”

“Stay out of it, Taehyun.” The _Alpha_ ’s navigator rolls her eyes.

“You’re the one who-”

“Fuck _you_ -”

“Eat shit-”

“You fucking bitch-”

“Okay, everyone, _calm down_!” Soobin stands up, brushing crumbs off his mouth with a table napkin. “ _Alpha_ crew, we are going to go back to work starting _now_ , and _Charlie_ , you all can return to your ship-”

“No, we came here to ask you something.”

Everyone turns to Chaeryeong, who’s just brushed Yeonjun and Beomgyu’s hands off of her.

‘What are you doing?’ Beomgyu mouths.

Chaeryeong ignores him. “I was able to call the _Bravo_ ’s medical officer two days into the expedition. Forty-five hours on our internal time, to be exact. When did you get their SOS?”

The _Alpha_ ’s entire crew look at their navigator. “Forty-five hours on our internal time.”

Soobin frowns. “How can that be?”

“We left almost an hour later.” Yeonjun admits, his ears reddening. “Our internal time is delayed by at least forty minutes.”

“Oh.” Soobin says.

Chaeryeong frowns. “Oh.” She echoes.

“Wait.” Taehyun says, perking up suddenly. “Where were they headed? Does anyone know?”

“Not sure where exactly, but I know it’s the same cluster as ours.” Yeonjun says. “At least that’s what Chan said.”

“Two days into the expedition…” Beomgyu frowns. “We were still in warp.”

“So were they.” Chaeryeong says. “Jeongin said they had five more days in warp when I talked to him.”

Yuna shakes her head. “But why would they care if their engine’s dead, if they were using the warp generator anyway?”

“Maybe they meant to say warp generator,” Yeji says. “But they made a mistake?”

“Changbin- I mean, their engineer wouldn’t make a mistake like that.” Beomgyu says.

“Neither would their captain.” Yeonjun says.

“What if the engine went down,” Taehyun says slowly. “Followed by the warp generator.”

Everyone stares at him.

“What would that mean?” Soobin asks.

“Then all of our calculations are wrong.” Yeonjun says. “The speedometer freezes when you go into warp, so the velocity we were using wasn’t accurate.”

“But if they left warp in the middle of it…” Soobin frowns.

“Nobody knows what happens to a ship if it comes out of warp without doing the cooldown.” Yuna says.

“Nobody knows _for sure_ ,” Beomgyu says. “But there are theories.”

Yuna scowls at him. “ _Conspiracy_ theories, sure.”

“Shut up and let the person who actually listened in _Warp Eng_ 400 talk.” Beomgyu says, holding a hand up to silence her.

“Beomgyu, you can say what you need to without being rude.” Yeonjun says.

“Somebody tell her that,” Beomgyu rolls his eyes. “Anyway, our current warp technology involves travelling outside of the ordinary space and time, but in a side _place_ where there is space and time of its own, which is why the warp isn’t instant.”

“Everyone knows that, Beomgyu.” Yuna says. “Cut to the weird shit.”

“Yeah, so the cooldown brings you back into this space and time from the other one exactly where and when you wanted it.” Beomgyu says. “Without the cooldown, one or both of those things would get fucked up.”

“So they’re either somewhere way off course or…” Yeonjun frowns. “Some _when_ different?”

“Or both.”

“So how will we know?” Chaeryeong asks. “How are we going to find them?”

“There are models we can use to calculate the probabilities. Quantum shit, but it’s not that hard to make. I could do it in a couple hours.” Beomgyu says. “The problem is it’d need an entire microship’s power to compute something like that.”

Soobin blinks at him. “So what are you saying?”

“We’ll need to shut down one of the ships’ nonessential functions,” Beomgyu says. “And all stay on the other ship for a few days.”

“A few d- _days_?” Yeonjun sputters.

Beomgyu grimaces as he says. “Yes.”

Soobin looks at his own engineer. “Is he for real?”

Yuna heaves a big sigh. “Sadly, yes.”


	12. Nonessential

“Okay, shutting down nonessential functions now,” Beomgyu says, pressing a button on his screen. The lights in the _Charlie_ ’s bridge dim down to just the vaguely purple emergency lights.

“All right.” Yeonjun nods, looking out at the outlines of the asteroids just outside their window. “Let’s all head to the _Alpha_.”

Nobody moves an inch from their seats.

“Do we _have_ to?” Ryujin asks. “Can’t we just stay here?”

“Artificial gravity’s going to shut down in five minutes.” Beomgyu says. “And oxygen.”

“How is fucking oxygen _nonessential_?” Ryujin makes a face.

“It’s not essential to the ship.” Taehyun says.

“The fuck? They should change the name, then.”

Chaeryeong hops out of her seat. “Come on, guys. The sooner we get out of here the sooner it all ends.”

“Actually if we all stay here for five more minutes it’ll all…” Taehyun frowns as he hears the others leave their seats, too. “Fine.”

Chaeryeong doesn’t like the way their ship looks without all the “nonessential” functions. It’s too dark, and the darkness is making her fingers tingle with the memory of something that never happened.

She picks up her backpack off the floor next to her bed-shelf, which has been sealed with the metal sliding door intended for landing and takeoff.

A hand lands on her back. “Come on,” Yeonjun says gently.

“Yeah.” Chaeryeong carries the backpack down to the ship’s entrance, where the other three are already getting into their exosuits.

She zips herself up in hers. Even though it’s supposedly tailored to her measurements, she doesn’t feel right in it. _Nothing about being in outer space is comfortable_ , she reminds herself as she puts her helmet on. _People aren’t really built for any of this_.

Yeonjun closes the door behind all of them, looking over the other four like he’s counting them off mentally.

“We’re all here.” Ryujin says.

“I know.” Yeonjun says irritably.

Chaeryeong follows the others through the narrow, cramped series of tunnels to the opposite ship. She doesn’t know why the architects and engineers who designed microship links decided it had to be _this_ claustrophobia-inducing.

Chaeryeong only manages to breathe normally again when they set foot in the other ship.

The _Alpha_ ’s captain is waiting for them. “We’ve decided to take shifts sleeping, so we have enough beds. You should take the first shift.”

“N-” Yeonjun looks over the crew of the _Charlie_ , who have been working nonstop for almost a day now. “Yes. Thank you.”

“Of course. If there’s anything else you need-”

“We’ll be fine.” Yeonjun says curtly.

Chaeryeong isn’t a fool. She sees the way the other captain looks at hers, and the way his face falls when Yeonjun doesn’t even look back at him. She gives him an apologetic smile and says, “Thank you, Captain Kim.”

“You’re welcome, Dr. Lee.”

Chaeryeong lays in the bed-shelf of the _Alpha_ ’s navigator. Her name is Lia, as glowing pink letters on the ceiling of the shelf tell her. Lia’s stuck 3D fake flowers all over the ceiling of her bed-shelf, along with a few photos of what look like her friends and family. Without wanting to, Chaeryeong learns that Lia has a younger brother, and two best friends in the navigator program that Chaeryeong only knows by face.

Chaeryeong feels like she’s intruding and she hates it, but she’s glad that at least she’s too uncomfortable to actually fall asleep.

She doesn’t want to fall asleep now, because she doesn’t want to see Jeongin.

_No. I want to see Jeongin more than anything._

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun jumps in his seat like he’d been shocked.

_What the hell?_

He looks down from the captain’s mezzanine to the hundreds of crew milling about their stations below.

The painful ringing in his ears starts next, making him bend over in pain.

“Yeonjun!”

“Get away from me! Leave me alone!” Yeonjun shouts. “I already have to deal with you while I’m awake, let me fucking _rest_!”

“Are you okay?” Soobin’s hands cradle Yeonjun’s face. “What’s wrong?”

“Fuck off.” Yeonjun pushes him away.

He knows it doesn’t matter what happens to the Soobin in his dream, but he feels bad for pushing him just the same.

He sighs and gets up despite the pain. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Soobin says brushing his pants off as he stands up. “What’s going on?”

Yeonjun frowns at him. “You’re awake right now. You’re in the bridge.”

Soobin blinks, confused. “Y- Yes I am. Why?”

“So it’s not you.” Yeonjun sighs.

“It _is_ me, Yeonjun,” Soobin reaches out and touches Yeonjun’s face again.

Yeonjun doesn’t flinch away. _If this is all really a dream… why would my subconscious make him behave like this? I don’t want this at all._

“Do you want me to take you to the medical bay?” Soobin asks. “You don’t look so-”

“Good luck trying.” Yeonjun says, noticing the unusual darkness outside the ship’s window.

Soobin puts an arm around Yeonjun to support him. “Come on, let’s get you checked up.”

Yeonjun sighs, letting the imaginary Soobin his subconscious has cooked up for him carry his entire weight. “Three… two… one.”

“W- What’s that?”

“Fuck if I know.”

The darkness consumes them both.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun wakes up with a start, gasping for breath.

He sits up before pulling back the curtain of his bed-shelf.

The view of the common area is wrong.

_Oh. Right._ He’d forgotten he was in the bed-shelf of the _Alpha_ ’s pilot. She’d left it bare, just like he had in his own bed-shelf back in the _Charlie_.

He steps out of the bed-shelf, carefully arranging the sheets, ironing them out with his hands.

“Don’t bother.” Yeji says behind him. “I’m going to mess it up anyway.”

“I just wanted to-”

Yeji yawns as she nudges Yeonjun out of her way. “Good night, Captain Choi.”

She climbs into the bed-shelf and pulls the curtain shut.

Yeonjun steps back into the common area. He looks at the other four bed-shelves’ curtains, which are all drawn shut. _How long have I been asleep?_

He climbs the stairs to the bridge.

He tugs on the sliding door, but it’s locked. _Oh. Right. They follow protocol around here._

He frowns at the biometric scanner.

The door slides open.

“Morning, Captain.” Taehyun calls out from the navigations and comms station.

Yeonjun looks around. Chaeryeong’s sitting in the medical officer chair, Ryujin in the pilot’s chair, and Beomgyu in the engineer’s chair.

“How… How long have you all been up?” Yeonjun frowns.

“Four hours.” Taehyun replies.

“You needed the rest, so we let you sleep in.” Chaeryeong says.

Yeonjun shakes his head. “But their pilot-”

“She’s a very understanding person.” Ryujin says, putting her boots up on the dashboard. She quickly plants them back on the floor when she realizes she’s not in her own station.

“I was gonna say she’s another android who doesn’t sleep,” Beomgyu says. “But sure, let’s go with that.”

Yeonjun stops before the captain’s chair. It looks just like his – it’s identical, really, same fake leather upholstery and glass-coated panels and exterior – but he doesn’t know if he actually wants to sit in it.

“Sit down.” Chaeryeong says, standing next to him.

Yeonjun frowns at her. “But-”

“I’m going to check your vitals,” Chaeryeong says, not bothering to make it sound like anything other than a direct order. “Sit down.”

Yeonjun lowers himself into the seat, grimacing as the cushion holds his weight weirdly, like it’s used to someone else. _Because it is_.

Chaeryeong rolls Yeonjun’s sleeve back to clip the monitors to his arm.

Yeonjun stifles a yawn with his free hand. “Sorry.”

Chaeryeong just watches the stats appear on her tablet in silence.

“How are you holding up?” Yeonjun asks quietly his native dialect.

Beomgyu and Taehyun look at each other first, then turn curiously to Yeonjun.

“What’d you say, Cap?” Ryujin asks from where she’s trying to clean the pilot’s dashboard with her bare hands.

Yeonjun speaks more slowly. _Maybe she’s just rusty_. “How are you?”

Chaeryeong gives him a sad smile. “I don’t speak,” She replies in a wobbly accent.

“Oh.” Yeonjun lowers his head. “Sorry.”

Chaeryeong unclips the monitors, pressing on a button to retract all the cords into the mechanism’s body. She tucks it all into the kit hanging from her belt.

“I never learned,” Chaeryeong admits, going back to her crisp, flawless Moon dialect _._ “My grandparents get on me for that all the time.”

“It’s okay.” Yeonjun says. “It’s much more useful to know how to speak Moon.”

Chaeryeong starts for her own seat. “It’s not about usefulness.”

They come down at the end of their shift to find a huge holographic note stuck to the kitchen cabinet:

_WASH YOUR OWN DISHES. -HYJ_

The crew of the _Alpha_ all look at each other, pointing in silence.

‘Was it you?’ Beomgyu points at Ryujin.

Ryujin shakes her head so aggressively her cheeks wobble. ‘No way. Yeonjun was the last one up.’

Taehyun nudges Yeonjun. ‘Did you-’

“No.” Yeonjun rips the note off the wall, not bothering to watch it dissipate to nothing. He pulls the kitchen sink out of the wall to find it empty. “What the hell were they talking about?”

“Someone left half a mug of milk.”

They turn to find Yeji standing in front of the common area table with her arms crossed.

“It wasn’t any of us.” Yeonjun says.

Ryujin and Beomgyu start pulling ingredients out of the ship’s pantry, discussing what they’re having for dinner.

“Hey, hold up.” Yuna’s just stumbled out of her bed-shelf but she strides over to block the pantry. “What the hell do you guys think you’re doing? Our stores aren’t _unlimited_ -”

Beomgyu wags the packet of frozen beef in her face. “We’re just getting _one_ packet of beef, bitch.”

“You want us to _starve_?” Ryujin asks, her arms full of sauces and vegetables. She holds them close to her chest, turning away as the _Alpha_ ’s engineer tries to grab some of them back.

“Excuse me.” Yeji says, nudging all of them out of her way with her shoulders as she fills a mug with black coffee.

She spoons eight scoops of sugar into it, to Ryujin’s horror. “H- Hold up.”

Yuna tugs on the packet of frozen beef. “Stop taking all our good stuff-”

Beomgyu holds fast to the meat. “Fuck you, Shin Yuna-”

“Just pick something else.” Yeonjun groans.

“No!” Ryujin says. “We’re having _beef_ tonight!”

“What’s going on?” Soobin pulls back his bed-shelf curtain, his puffy eyes still shut.

“They’re taking all of our good food!” Yuna whines.

“At least have the decency to take only what you need.” Yeji says, finally snatching the beef out of Beomgyu’s hands.

“Hey.” Chaeryeong tugs on the beef, but she doesn’t get anywhere. “We _do_ need that.”

Yeonjun’s going through the pantry’s database. “Let’s just have one of the canned-”

“No!” Ryujin says, she and Beomgyu teaming up to try to yank the packet of beef back from Yeji. “We need _real_ meat!”

“Just give them whatever they want.” Lia grumbles, rubbing her eyes as she steps out of her bed-shelf. Then she sees the pack of beef. “Oh hell no, not our _steak_!”

“They’re getting all the good stuff!” Yuna asks, taking the opportunity to grab half the ingredients out of Ryujin’s grasp.

“Hey!”

“Fucking bitch-”

“Leave us alone!”

“You leave _us_ alone!”

“Drop the steak, bitch!”

“ _You’re_ a bitch!”

The entire common area goes dark, like someone had doused every light. Yeonjun staggers backward into the wall, and still feeling the matte finish of the ship’s cabinetry, releases a sigh of relief.

The lights come back on, illuminating the terrified faces of everyone in the room.

Everyone except the _Alpha_ ’s medical officer, who’s got one finger on the light switch.

“Goddamn it, Kai.” Lia grumbles.

“Shut up.” Kai says calmly. “Everyone shut up.”

“We weren’t even-”

“Shut up. Thank you.” Kai raises a hand to silence everyone, his expression serene as a statue in a church or temple somewhere. “Everyone needs to calm the fuck down, because this is all stupid.”

No one disagrees.

“I don’t think we should bother pretending to do work-” Kai raises his hand again when half the crew of both ships open their mouths to protest. “-Because it’s just making us tired, not productive. We need to come to terms with the fact that for the next few days, there’s nothing to do.”

Yeonjun folds his arms. “We’ll go insane if we don’t do anything.”

“I know. So we should do something, but not work.” Kai breaks into a grin.

“I like the way you think, Dr. Jung.” Ryujin reaches out for a fist bump.

Soobin intercepts the fist bump with a disappointed frown. “We can’t play games while our friends are out there.”

“Yeah, but we don’t know where. And until we find out, there’s nothing we can do.” Kai says. “So I say we take care of our mental health so we’ve got enough brain cells left when it’s time to go rescue them.”

Chaeryeong scowls. “That’s not what mental health is.”

Kai turns to her with a softer expression. “But you get what I mean, right?”

Chaeryeong shakes her head slowly, looking out of the window.

“Captain?” Kai turns to Soobin.

“I…” Soobin looks at Yeonjun. “What do you think, Yeonjun?”

“I think it’s downright distasteful considering what the crew of the _Bravo_ might be going through.”

Soobin’s mouth curls into a nervous little w shape. He gives Kai an apologetic nose scrunch. “Well-”

“But we might all end up murdering each other over something stupid if we carry on like this.” Yeonjun says. “So I don’t know.”

Soobin’s brow wrinkles. “Uh, let’s vote on it. Who wants to continue taking shifts as planned?”

Not a single person raises their hand, though Yeji’s hand twitches for a moment.

“I guess it’s decided, then.” Soobin nods to Kai. “We’ll go with your plan, Dr. Jung.”


	13. Jung Kai’s 6-Step Mental Health Protection Regimen

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“There are 6 steps to my Mental Health Protection Regimen.” Kai said as he pulled up a hologram slide deck that he had been keeping for god knows how long._

_Everyone standing around the bridge of the Alpha gave him looks with various levels of confidence. All of these levels were low._

_“You realize we’re only going to be stuck together for a few days, right?” Beomgyu made a face._

_“Yes.” Kai flicked over to the next slide regardless. “First is chicken noodle soup.”_

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Beomgyu watches the _Alpha_ ’s medical officer chop onions. Rather, he’s just hacking away at the onion like it’s wronged him somehow.

Beomgyu looks across the kitchen at Ryujin, who’s already shaking her head.

‘This ain’t it,’ Ryujin mouths at him.

Beomgyu mouths, ‘Enough of this bullshit. Put some flavor in the damn soup.’

Ryujin nods and gives him a solemn ok symbol with one hand.

Beomgyu closes his eyes and drops to the floor with a loud thud.

Ryujin gasps loudly, like a vacuum cleaner that’s just started up. “Oh no! Beomgyu!”

Kai stops murdering the onions and looks up. “What happened to him?” He asks calmly, putting the knife down to squint down at Beomgyu.

“I don’t know! You’re the doctor!” Ryujin says. “Go do something!”

Kai squats next to Beomgyu and pokes him in the shoulder. “Hey hey, are you good?”

Beomgyu resists the urge to throttle the _Alpha_ ’s medical officer.

Meanwhile, Ryujin dashes over to the kitchenette and starts tipping various things into the pot boiling away on the stove.

Kai pokes Beomgyu in the ribs.

Beomgyu concentrates very, very hard on not squirming.

Kai pokes him again.

_Give me strength¸_ Beomgyu says, holding his breath. _Hurry the fuck up Ryujin._

Kai pokes him in the stomach, but doesn’t take his finger away. He wiggles his finger.

_Fuck this_. Beomgyu sputters and starts laughing.

“Oh, he’s fine.” Kai grins at Ryujin. Then he frowns. “What are you doing?”

Ryujin freezes in place with a spoon of chili paste in one hand and the pot of chili paste in the other. “Nothing.”

She tips the pot of chili paste in before Kai can stop her.

Kai lowers the pot onto the table and lifts the lid. The crew of both ships are standing around the common area table, blinking rapidly in the spicy steam coming off the pot.

Soobin scratches his head as the tears well up in his eyes. “Uh… it’s a bit… _colorful_ for chicken noodle soup.”

Yeji scowls at Kai. “I thought you knew how to make chicken noodle soup?”

Kai points at Ryujin, who lets out another vacuum cleaner gasp.

Yeji pivots her scowl to Ryujin.

“It was Beomgyu’s idea.” Ryujin points at Beomgyu.

Beomgyu lets out a guttural gasp like a fish on land. “I told you to add some fucking flavor to the soup, not _weaponize_ it.”

“Whatever. It’s still food, so let’s not waste it.” Yeonjun says, scooping the soup into ten bowls.

Nobody touches the bowls.

Chaeryeong places a hand on Yeonjun’s arm. “Yeonjun, I’m not sure it’s safe-”

“Let’s not waste it.” Yeonjun says forcefully as he picks up a spoon and takes a sip of soup.

Everyone backs a step or two away from him.

Yeonjun frowns.

A bead of sweat rolls down the side of his forehead.

“Holy shit, he’s dying.” Lia says, covering her mouth with one hand.

Yeonjun starts taking deep breaths, his face getting red. “I’m. Fine.”

Kai puts a hand on Chaeryeong’s shoulder. “I’ll get the emergency kit.”

“Yeah, good call.”

“I’m! Fine!” Yeonjun insists, but his sweat is gluing his hair to his face now.

“Hey Yeonjun,” Soobin slides a chair towards him, keeping a safe 1-meter buffer between them. “Maybe you wanna sit down-”

Yeonjun’s stern face crinkles up in pain. Then he lets out a raspy cough like he’s trying to get rid of a lung.

Ryujin tries to help him to the chair. “Yeah, maybe you should-”

“Get away from me Shin Ryujin I might just kill you right now.” Yeonjun coughs out, bent over in pain.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“What’s step 2?” Ryujin asked, clearly bored with the meeting already. She’d started using a pencil to pick dirt off her boots, to the annoyance of everyone in the room._

_“Glad you asked,” Kai smiled at her. “You made the madeleines, right?”_

_“That I did.” Ryujin beamed proudly._

_“They were delightful.” Kai gives her two thumbs up. “Can you make chocolate chip cookies?”_

_“Oh please, I can do that shit with my eyes closed.” Ryujin scoffs._

_“I’d rather you did it with your eyes open.” Yeonjun and Yeji said at once. They frowned at each other._

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“This is a bit _much_ , guys,” Ryujin laughs awkwardly, squirming against the carbon fiber cords tying her down to the seat.

“Not for you.” Yeonjun growls at her from where he’s sitting across the common area. His voice hasn’t quite returned yet, so he’s just growling at everyone whether he means to or not.

Soobin holds a glass of water out to him.

Yeonjun scowls. “That’ll make it worse.”

“Here you go, Captain.” Taehyun tosses Yeonjun a carton of milk.

Soobin shrugs and drinks the glass of water.

Ryujin bounces around her chair, scraping it against the floor as loudly as he possibly could. “But who’s gonna bake the cookies if I’m-”

“Stop making noise.” Yeji snaps at her.

Yuna stops lifting ingredients out of the pantry to laugh at Ryujin, whose face has gotten very red. “You really thought you were the only one who could bake? Cute.”

“Ta-da!” Yuna places the plate of cookies in the middle of the table. The bottom of the plate has just barely touched the surface of the table, but half the cookies are already gone.

Taehyun takes the carton of milk from Yeonjun and pours himself a glass.

“Oh, smart, smart,” Lia agrees, holding out her mug to Taehyun.

“You know I am.” Taehyun says as he pours her some milk.

“Aw, shut up you third-ranked bitch.” Lia says with a friendly smile. She and Taehyun clink their mug and glass together before dipping their cookies in milk.

Ryujin jumps forward, still tied to the chair. “Beomgyu! Beomgyu! Choi Beomgyu! Hey, _slut_!”

Beomgyu licks crumbs off his fingers and reaches for another cookie as if he can’t hear a thing.

“Beomgyu!” Ryujin sighs, slumping over as much as she can with the carbon fiber cords around her. “Bitch! Give me a cookie! Beom-”

“Oh shut up.” Yuna says, stuffing a cookie in Ryujin’s mouth.

Ryujin scowls at her, but chews anyway. She swallows before letting out a derisive noise. “Hah. You didn’t put enough butter. Rookie mistake.”

“ _I_ measured the butter.” Chaeryeong says, frowning.

“Oh, what did I say? It’s perfect.” Ryujin nods aggressively. “Just perfect. Couldn’t have done it better myself.”

“Aw, stuff it.” Chaeryeong laughs and puts another cookie in Ryujin’s mouth.

Ryujin chews quickly to say something else, but Yeji comes in with another cookie to gag her before she can even take a breath.

Ryujin pouts at her with half the cookie still hanging out of her mouth.

Chaeryeong laughs. “Hey, Yuna, could you take a photo of this?”

“Already done, ma’am.” Yuna says with a sharp salute.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“Step 3 is…” Kai drummed his hands on the table. “…Massage Monkey time!”_

_“Those are illegal.” Yeji said immediately._

_Kai reached under the table and pulled out a large X-shaped pillow. It was covered in a soft brown artificial fur._

_Soobin straightened up in his seat. “Dr. Jung, why do you have one of those?”_

_“For my back, obviously.” Kai said. He narrowed his eyes at the crew of the_ Charlie _. “Which one of you has back problems?”_

_Yeonjun straightened up indignantly. “_ My _crew follow Fleet regulations-”_

_“Actually, I’ve got two mini-Monkeys.” Taehyun admitted._

_Yeonjun’s ears grew red as he lowered his head._

_Beomgyu and Ryujin laughed, slapping fives. “Nice one, Taehyun!”_

_“Honestly, I don’t see why they’re banned in the first place.” Chaeryeong said._

_Yeonjun gave her a desperate look. “Not you too.”_

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“You know these things cost a _fortune_?” Beomgyu says, holding up one of Taehyun’s mini Massage Monkeys.

“I got it half off.” Taehyun says proudly.

“Half off a hundred thousand is still fifty grand.” Ryujin snorts, still tied to the chair.

Yeonjun looks troubled at that. “ _A hundred thousand?_ ”

Kai takes the mini-Monkey from Beomgyu’s hand and places it back on the table with the other mini-Monkey, and his own full-sized Monkey. He looks up to find Yeji is standing off to one side, arms crossed and a deep frown on her face. Soobin’s standing next to her, but he’s been giving the Massage Monkeys a wistful look. Yeonjun’s standing on the opposite side of the room, deep in thought like he’s calculating how many meals a hundred thousand can buy.

“We don’t have enough for everyone,” Kai says. “So we’ll just have to take turns.”

“Or we can extend them.” Yuna says.

“Absolutely not.” Beomgyu grabs all of the four x-shaped pillows in his arms, holding them close to his chest. He frowns at Kai. “She’s going to break them.”

Kai stands between Yuna and Beomgyu, using his arms to form a human shield. “Don’t.”

“Oh please, I’m not going to _break_ them. Not permanently, anyway.” Yuna scowls at Beomgyu.

“So what’re you going to do?” Lia asks. “If you can extend Monkeys, why isn’t everyone doing it?”

“Because not everyone’s smart enough to.” Yuna says.

“It’s just electrodes and stuff, it’s not _that_ big a cognitive leap.” Beomgyu says.

“So what’s going to happen to my Monkeys?” Taehyun asks, like a concerned father hanging around his kids’ doctors.

“Nothing.” Yuna says, extending a hand to Beomgyu. “Give me one.”

Beomgyu sighs and hands her Kai’s Massage Monkey.

Yuna looks around the room. “How many are we? Ten?”

“I’m not joining.” Yeji says.

“Me neither.” Yeonjun says.

Yuna looks over at Soobin. “What about you, Captain Kim?”

“I, uh…” Soobin casts a nervous look in Yeji’s direction. “No thanks, I’ll pass.”

“Oh, this should be enough for seven people.” Yuna shrugs as she looks over their three Monkeys.

“No, the mini-Monkeys won’t be able to handle the electrical load,” Beomgyu says, in a tone that sounds like he’d just left out the word _‘dumbass’_. He takes one of the mini-Monkeys, feeling along the edge for a seam.

Then he pulls on the seam, peeling the fur coat off the pillow.

Taehyun lets out a strangled cry. “That was a birthday present…”

“Relax, it’s fine.” Beomgyu digs through the foam stuffing until he pulls out something that looks like an octopus made of metal and wires, with shiny, disc-like suckers running down its tentacles.

Taehyun steps back. “They look like _that_ on the inside?”

“Yup.” Beomgyu pulls a multi-tool out of his pocket while Yuna starts peeling the fur and stuffing off of Kai’s Monkey.

“So we’ll still have to take turns anyway,” Yuna says. “Unless _someone_ out there is hiding another Massage Monkey.”

Lia laughs. “A hypocritical bitch, maybe?” She and Yuna turn to their pilot, who’s still standing by the wall.

Ryujin bounces in her chair. “No _way_ , Hwang Yeji, are they for _real_?”

Yeji coughs.

Soobin gives her a concerned look. “Pilot Hwang are you o-”

“This is stupid.” Yeji says, before storming out of the common area.

Soobin hesitates at the door. He looks back at Lia and Yuna, who’s busy unscrewing something in Kai’s Monkey. “You didn’t have to be so mean to her.”

“Hey.”

Yeji turns. “Oh. It’s you.”

She closes the wall panel she’s just opened up in the _Alpha_ ’s engine room. She’s holding a large X-shaped pillow in her arms. Her Massage Monkey is much larger than even Kai’s and has much thicker, deep purple fur.

“Here.” Yeji holds the Monkey out. “Give it to the others.”

Yeonjun stays exactly where he is, stopping the door from sliding shut automatically.

“Don’t give me that look.” Yeji places the Monkey in his hands whether he wants it or not. “I’m sure you’ve broken some rules, too.”

“I’ve never.” Yeonjun says.

Yeji sighs. “Not even the Academy’s curfew?”

“Never.”

“Never been late for class?”

“Never.” Yeonjun says.

Yeji starts laughing.

Yeonjun just frowns at her, gripping the pillow in his hands. “What’s so funny?”

“I never thought I’d meet anyone lamer than me, but you’re really…” Yeji says, taking the Massage Monkey back from Yeonjun. “Come on, Captain Choi, let’s ruin your streak.”

“I have to put _what_?” Yeonjun makes a face.

“You have to stick these electrodes on your back.” Beomgyu says again, holding out four little suction cups haphazardly duct taped to multicolored wires.

Yeonjun looks around at the rest of his crew. Ryujin’s been untied from her chair, and is lying face-down on a blanket on the floor while Chaeryeong sticks electrodes on her. Taehyun’s already half-asleep, leaning against the wall with four wires snaking out from under the back of his t-shirt.

Beomgyu rattles the wires. “Come on, Cappy.”

“Absolutely not. Is this even safe?” Yeonjun scowls.

“Cappy-”

“Let me do it.” Yeji says, taking the wires from Beomgyu. She nudges Yeonjun on the shoulder. “Face the wall, Captain Choi.”

Yeonjun doesn’t stop scowling, but he listens. Beomgyu starts laughing.

Yeji lifts the back of Yeonjun’s shirt and starts sticking the electrodes on his shoulder blades.

“W- We’re not going to be much help to our friends if we’re all dead.” Yeonjun sputters out.

“Stop moving.” Yeji says, flicking him on the back with one finger. “I can’t believe there’s someone who needs this more than _I_ do.”

Yeonjun tries to turn his head to frown at her. “What do you mean?”

“She means you’ve got a bigger stick up your ass than she does.” Beomgyu says, patting Yeonjun on the arm.

Yeji frowns at him. “Ew.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“Once we’re all relaxed by the Massage Monkeys-”_

_“Which are illegal.” Yeji muttered under her breath._

_“Yeah, of course.” Kai nodded placidly. “After our_ illegal _activities, we’ll do some skincare.”_

_Yeji folded her arms. “Pardon?”_

_“You know, face masks, things like that.” Kai smiled._

_“But we don’t have any of those.” Chaeryeong sighed. “We weren’t allowed to bring non-essentials.”_

_“You can make them from scratch.” Beomgyu said. “Eggs and stuff.”_

_Kai made a face. “Eggs? On my_ face _? Nah, we’re just going to use the regular packaged stuff.”_

_Yeji shook her head. “But no one-”_

_Kai gave the base of Soobin’s chair a hard kick. Soobin stood up, startled as the panel at the side of the chair gave a loud creak, then slid open, revealing a compartment stuffed with what looked like enough skincare products to last a person an entire year._

_Yeonjun glared at Soobin._

_Soobin blushed deeply. “M- My mom forced me to-”_

_“I knew it!” Lia yelled jumping out of her seat, pumping both fists in the air. “I FUCKING KNEW IT!”_

_Soobin scratched behind one ear sheepishly. “You guys could’ve just asked, I mean-”_

_“Since the illegal stuff are here anyway and we’re now all aware of it and complicit in the crime,” Kai smiled sagely. “Might as well use them.”_

_“That’s not how it works.” Yeji frowned._

_“This is beginning to sound like a plan to get us all kicked out of the Academy.” Yeonjun muttered._

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun blinks up at the ceiling. He doesn’t even feel it when someone peels the electrodes from his back. He doesn’t even know who does it, he just stays lying on his side on a blanket on the floor of the _Alpha’s_ common area. He realizes why he’s never touched a Massage Monkey before, even when they were passing them around the dorm.

He feels calm, though he knows there’s plenty of reasons for him not to be. He’s so calm that it’s freaking him out, but for some reason, he just lays there.

“Hey, Cappy,”

Yeonjun looks up to find Beomgyu and Chaeryeong sitting on the floor next to him. He gives them both a languid smile. “Did you inject me with something?”

Beomgyu laughs. “Trust me, we’re saving the tranquilizers for when you completely lose it.”

“ _If_ he does.” Chaeryeong corrects him gently. She’s unscrewing a jar filled with a greenish-white jelly. “Here, this goes on your face for 3 minutes.”

Yeonjun squirms away. “Absolutely not.”

“It’s just waterless cleanser, don’t be a little bitch.” Beomgyu drops a gob of the stuff on Yeonjun’s face before the latter can complain.

Yeonjun scrunches up his nose, but his back still feels too nice for him to move. So he just closes his eyes and lets Chaeryeong and Beomgyu do whatever it is they’re doing to him.

It feels nice.

“I never looked at it this close before, but your skin _sucks_ , Cappy.” Beomgyu says, poking Yeonjun on the cheek.

“Screw you.” Yeonjun mumbles just as they lay a full mask on his face. The membrane clings to his skin, sealing his mouth shut.

Yeonjun tries to frown at Chaeryeong, but he can’t move his face.

Chaeryeong’s closing her eyes while Beomgyu puts a mask on her face.

Yeonjun rolls over onto his back, looking up at where the ceiling of the common area should be. But they’ve dimmed everything but the warm floor lights, so he’s looking up into near darkness.

It reminds him of something, but he’s too relaxed to remember what it is.

_This is why I don’t let my guard down, it makes me stupid._

Yeonjun’s eyelids flutter shut.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_Kai swiped to the next slide in his deck. “This is step 5.”_

_Everyone in the bridge found themselves looking at a stock image of a bonfire._

_“Absolutely not.” Yeonjun said without bothering to take a breath._

_“I think we’re going to have to draw the line here.” Soobin frowned._

_Yeji rolled her eyes at him. “Only here?”_

_“Hear me out,” Kai said._

_“No.”_

_“No.”_

_“Absolutely not.”_

_“Captain, I think Dr. Jung is insane.”_

_“I agree.”_

_“I’m gonna have to say no to Step 5, Dr. Jung.” Soobin said with an apologetic look._

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun wakes up.

The first thing he realizes is that he didn’t have his usual dream. He didn’t have any dream at all.

_Which is great._ Yeonjun smiles.

The next thing he realizes is that his face mask is gone – Chaeryeong had said something about it dissolving into his face after twenty minutes, which is an idea that Yeonjun is only beginning to be disturbed by.

The last, and probably most important thing he realizes is that his back is warm.

Yeonjun turns away from the wall and sits up.

“Oh, you’re awake!”

Yeonjun frowns at Soobin. _Why is he talking to me? Maybe this is the dream._

Soobin frowns back, his face faintly lit with a warm glow. His eyes are bright as ever.

_Well, it’s a bad dream if it is one._

“We didn’t wake you up because your medical officer said you needed the rest,” Soobin says.

“Doesn’t she always.” Yeonjun looks across the room at Chaeryeong, who gives him a guilty little smile. ‘Sorry,’ She mouths.

Soobin scoots to the side, giving Yeonjun some space to join the rest of them. They’re seated in a circle around this red-hot glowing coil that seems to be twisted in the shape of…

_A heart._ Yeonjun frowns, feeling the heat from the coil tickle his face.

“The engineers made it from the toaster’s heating coil.” Soobin explains.

“But we’re not supposed to tamper with-” Yeonjun makes a face. “You mean the engineers worked _together_?”

“Yeah.” Soobin grins, nodding over to where Beomgyu and Yuna are fighting over a glass container.

“Hey!” Ryujin barks at them both. “Yeonjun hasn’t had any yet, you pigs!”

“Who’re you calling pig, _pig_?” Yuna barks back, but Beomgyu slides the container across the floor to Yeonjun.

Yeonjun opens the container and, in the dim light, squints at its white contents.

“Marshmallows.” Ryujin says.

“I see that.” Yeonjun says.

Ryujin plucks one of the marshmallows out of the container and spears it at the end of a telescopic pair of tongs.

“Those are for sample collection,” Yeonjun says. “We shouldn’t be playing with those.”

“We can always wash them later.” Soobin says, holding another pair of sample collection tongs out to Yeonjun.

“No thanks.” Yeonjun says, not even looking his way. “Are none of you concerned about what’ll happen to us when the Academy finds out about this?”

“They won’t.” Taehyun says flatly. “We cut the CCTV recording.”

Lia, who’s been busy setting up something on her hologram watch display, stops and gives him a quick high-five. “We’ll just have to say that the entire system got fried.”

“We already made the incident report.” Yeji adds.

Yeonjun looks up at her, deeply hurt. _And here I thought there was one person I could trust._

Soobin reaches over Yeonjun’s lap to get two marshmallows. He sticks them to the end of his tongs, pressing the button to extend it out over their makeshift electric bonfire.

Yeonjun frowns at the other captain. _Soobin knows for sure that nothing will happen to him no matter_ what _he does, but what about the rest of us?_

_He really doesn’t give a shit._

Soobin grins from ear to ear as he reels the toasted marshmallows back in. He tries to grab one, but it’s too hot, so he whips his hand back and starts sucking on his fingers. He notices Yeonjun looking at him and grimaces self-consciously. “Do you want one?”

“No. Thanks.” Yeonjun looks at the others as they toast their own marshmallows over the coil.

_Someone has to do something_.

Yeonjun stands up, which gets everyone to stop looking at their marshmallows for a second. A miracle, if you’d ask Yeonjun.

“Has anyone forgotten why we’re all stuck together in the first place?” Yeonjun frowns at each of them. “Our friends are out there and god knows what they’re going through, while you’re all here eating- _Urghmf_!”

Yeonjun never gets to finish his sentence, because a marshmallow has just landed squarely in his mouth.

Everyone turns to Chaeryeong, who’s just calmly dusting cornstarch off her fingers. She picks up another marshmallow and spears it at the end of her tongs.

“Do you really think we could forget?” Chaeryeong asks.

Yeonjun chews and swallows. “No. I’m sorry.”

He sits back down, but he stays out of the circle, leaning against the wall. He just doesn’t understand why even Chaeryeong, who has every reason to be worried about the crew of the _Bravo_ , is behaving like this.

“A-ha!” Lia jumps up, breaking the relative silence (less than half of the people present chew with their mouths closed). She presses a button on her watch, and a bright pink hologram shimmers into view over her lap. Lia picks up the object by its long neck, resting the body against one leg.

She runs one fingertip across the six strings stretched across the hologram.

The sound washes over the entire common area like rain.

Yeonjun has never seen a hologram guitar before. He scoots a little closer despite himself.

Ryujin holds out an arm to stop him from coming closer. “We already know it’s not allowed, don’t even-”

“I didn’t say anything.” Yeonjun says.

“You looked like you were going to.”

Lia strums the guitar again. Then she starts playing a few chords.

Everyone smiles when they recognize the song.

Except Yeonjun. He’s never heard this song before in his life.

Most of the others start singing as soon as Lia does, some of them laughing as their own voices squeak and crack from lack of use.

Yeonjun frowns as even Chaeryeong joins in for the chorus. _Why does she know this song? Why don’t I?_

Ryujin and Kai are clapping their hands to the beat like they’re trying to see who’s louder.

Taehyun’s holding up his tongs backwards like a microphone as he sings, swaying with Beomgyu and Yuna to the beat.

Soobin laughs and claps his hands, mumbling along since it seems he only knows every other word and none of the tune. Yeji slaps him playfully on the arm, correcting his lyrics.

Lia barely finishes the first song before going straight into another one that Yeonjun doesn’t know.

Yeonjun scoots back against the wall. Yuna and Beomgyu stand up and start dancing, arguing whether the dance to this song goes this way or that. Yeonjun obviously doesn’t know who’s right, since he didn’t even know this song came with a dance at all.

“No way, that’s not how it goes!” Lia says.

“Oh really?” Yuna crosses her arms.

“Let’s see you do it.” Beomgyu says, hands on his hips.

“Yeah. I’ll show you how it’s done.” Lia says, holding the hologram guitar out. “Who else wants to play?”

Yeonjun’s fingers twitch.

“I’ll do it!”

“Whoah, Taehyun, is there anything you can’t do?” Ryujin laughs.

“No.” Taehyun says brightly as he takes the guitar from Lia. He’s just settled it in his lap when he continues the song exactly where Lia had left it off.

Lia gets up and bounces around, waiting for the next chorus. Then she launches into a dance with all the grace of a person who’d touched a live wire while their hands were wet.

“No, no, no!” Beomgyu laughs, pushing Lia out of the way.

Yuna crumples to the ground in laughter. “What the hell was that!”

“I’m right! I’m right!” Lia insists, but she’s laughing, too.

“Doesn’t it go more like this?” Yeji asks, standing up.

“Oh shit, Hwang Yeji in the _house_!” Kai shouts, with Taehyun supplying the necessary air horns as he strums.

Yeji waits for Taehyun to hit the next chorus, and accompanied by Ryujin and Soobin yelling the chorus on every key but the real one, starts dancing.

“YEAAAAH!”

“FUCK IT UP, YEJI!”

“THAT’S _MY_ PILOT!”

“HWANG YEJI!” They chant to the beat. “HWANG YEJI!”

Yeji sweeps into a deep bow once Taehyun finishes the song, her face red not from the dancing, but from the embarrassing amount of applause from the others.

Taehyun strums a few random chords. “Does anyone have any requests?”

Beomgyu sits down next to Chaeryeong, throwing an arm across her shoulders. “What do you want?”

“Why me?” Chaeryeong giggles, scrunching up her nose.

“Because all we know is dumb Moon pop,” Beomgyu says. All the other girls nod solemnly in agreements.

“I don’t play,” Chaeryeong says quickly. “And I don’t listen to much Earth music, either. It’s all Moon pop back home, too.”

“Really?” Lia frowns.

Chaeryeong sighs. “Yeah, I mean, my grandparents still listen to Earth songs, but not many people do in my dome.”

“That’s interesting.” Lia says.

Yeonjun’s never been to Chaeryeong’s dome, but he can’t imagine how and where they would play Moon pop there. _In the community center? In the factories and warehouses?_

“Yeonjun, you play guitar, don’t you?”

Yeonjun turns, ignoring the eight surprised faces looking at him, to squint at Soobin. “Pardon?”

“Oh.” Soobin laughs self-consciously. “I- I just thought- Since you said-”

Yeonjun makes a face at him. _When did I say something like that? To_ you _?_

“Woooooh go Captain!” Taehyun hoots, holding the hologram guitar out to Yeonjun.

Yeonjun glares at him.

“Wooooh never mind!” Taehyun chuckles nervously, drawing the guitar back.

Yeonjun leans back against the wall. The entire common area has fallen into a tired silence, save for the occasional chewing from Kai and Ryujin finishing up the last of the marshmallows. Chaeryeong and Beomgyu have slid back to lean against the wall, resting their heads against each other.

Chaeryeong gives Yeonjun a weak smile.

“Fine.” Yeonjun says, extending a hand in Taehyun’s direction.

“What?” Taehyun frowns.

“Give me the guitar.”

“Oh.”

Yeonjun doesn’t like the way the hologram guitar has no weight, but buzzes against his fingertips when he touches it, like some sort of haptic feedback. He tries strumming. It’s an unpleasant experience, to say the least.

Lia and Taehyun flinch at the sound, but they give Yeonjun supportive grimaces.

Yeonjun adjusts the guitar in his arms. He hates it when people give him that sympathetic look you give little children trying something out for the first time.

“I only know Earth folk songs.” Yeonjun says.

“That’s okay.” Soobin says.

“I wasn’t asking for permission.” Yeonjun adjusts the hologram again. There’s something inherently wrong about a guitar without weight, but he can deal with it. He arranges his fingers and starts strumming.

The others smile at him, but it’s that sympathetic look you give a child when you have no idea what they’re saying.

Yeonjun keeps playing anyway, clearing his throat as he nears the end of the introduction.

“ _Fly me to the moon,”_ He sings, smiling at the way his Earth accent sits in his throat. “ _And let me sing among the stars_ ,”

Chaeryeong’s smile widens, but she clearly doesn’t know what this song is. Yeonjun didn’t expect her to, but he had a little bit of hope anyway.

“ _Let me see what spring is like in Jupiter or Mars_ ,” Yeonjun continues singing. “ _In other words, hold my hand… In other words, baby kiss me,_ ”

Beomgyu nudges the rest of the crew into swaying to the beat. _Dependable Beomgyu_.

“ _Fill my heart with song, and let me sing for ever more_ ,” Yeonjun sings, swaying along with them. “ _You are all I long for, all I worship and adore_ …”

Yeji and Yuna put both hands above their heads, swaying like grass in the wind.

“ _In other words, please be true… In other words…”_ Yeonjun coughs. “That’s all I remember.”

He’s about to stop playing when someone finishes the song for him.

“ _I love you_.” Soobin sings, muddled with a heavy Moon accent.

Yeonjun stares at him.

His heart starts hammering against his chest.

“You listen to Earth songs?” Chaeryeong asks Soobin, grinning.

“Oh no, it’s just…” Soobin’s face grows red. “My dad does.”

“The _General_?” Yeji frowns.

“Yeah.”

“What does the song mean?” Taehyun asks.

“Oh, I don’t know.” Soobin laughs, scratching the back of his head. “I just know the sounds of the words.”

_Oh._ Yeonjun leans back against the wall, feeling like a fool for hearing his heartbeat in his ears. _He doesn’t know. He doesn’t even know._

“Do you know any other songs, Captain?” Ryujin asks, using a pair of tongs to poke Yeonjun in the knee.

Yeonjun frowns down at the toasted marshmallow residue on his pants. “No.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“Forget Step 5,” Yeji said curtly. “What’s Step 6?”_

_“Feel-good movie marathon.” Kai replied, flicking to the next slide._

_The slide was just a badly edited collage of various movie posters, mostly animated ones._

_Yeji looked across the room at Yeonjun with a deeply exhausted expression. Yeonjun just shook his head._

_“Damn, I should’ve brought some movies with me.” Ryujin snaps her fingers._

_“Don’t worry.” Kai tapped a keychain hanging from his belt onto his station. The contents of his personal storage drive popped up on their screen:_ 3,258 movies.

_Taehyun blinked in surprise. “How long will it take to watch that many movies?”_

_“Our entire lives, probably.” Yuna scoffed._

_“We’ll just watch two or three.” Kai frowned at them both. “Which one do you guys wanna-”_

_The entire bridge erupted in requests._

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun shrugs his jacket off and spreads it across his lap like a blanket. He leans against the wall, closing his eyes, but he can’t sleep. The movie Lia had insisted on is playing on the window’s screen, but Lia herself is lying on a blanket under the window, snoring gently. Yuna’s facedown and spread-eagle on a blanket next to her, next to Kai, who’s on his side, facing Taehyun, whose eyes don’t close all the way even though he’s fast asleep. Ryujin’s muttering in her sleep, where she’s curled up against the wall. Chaeryeong’s next to her, tossing and turning, though it doesn’t seem to bother Beomgyu, who’s sleeping with one arm over his face. Yeji’s sitting up against the wall opposite Yeonjun, but her head keeps bobbing left and right.

Soobin rolls up his jacket and tucks it into the crook of Yeji’s neck to keep her head steady as she sleeps. Yeji mumbles something as she hands him the jacket back, before leaning over to lay on the floor.

Soobin sighs and tucks the jacket under her head.

He looks up and notices Yeonjun looking his way.

Yeonjun closes his eyes, pretending to be asleep.

Yeonjun hears a rustle somewhere to his left.

He peeks one eye open just a little bit.

Soobin’s bent over the window’s control panel, trying (and failing) to stop the movie and switch it off.

Yeonjun shuts his eyes again. _Not my problem._

After some time, the sound from the movie cuts abruptly, and the light filtering through Yeonjun’s eyelids dims. _See? He could do it on his own._

Yeonjun opens his eyes just a little bit.

Soobin’s still standing by the window, but his shoulders are slouching more than usual.

_You’ve got to be kidding me._

Yeonjun watches Soobin’s shoulders rise and fall gently as the other captain slumps against the window, sliding down ever so slowly like leaves off a sloped roof.

Yeonjun waits for Soobin to come to his goddamned senses and wake up, but all he does is slide down further. _If he slides any further he’ll crush Lia. Then we’ll have real problems._

Yeonjun sighs as he gets up, tiptoeing around the sleeping crew to get to the window.

He catches Soobin before the latter falls onto his navigator.

“Wake up.”

Soobin rubs his eyes, turning over. There’s a blanket over him and a white jacket bundled under his head. He thinks it’s his at first, but then he remembers that he’d lent his to Yeji.

He looks up and finds Yeonjun squatting next to him, but he’s facing away from Soobin. “Wake up, Beomgyu.”

The _Charlie_ ’s engineer groans loudly. “No.”

“Choi Beomgyu.” Yeonjun says sternly. “I think the ship’s finished with its’ calculations.”

Soobin sits up. “What?”

Beomgyu puts a hand to his heart. “Holy shit, dude, you gave me a fucking heart attack. I thought you were asleep.”

“Sorry.” Soobin says.

“Get up, Beomgyu.” Yeonjun rises to his feet, nudging Beomgyu on the side with the tip of one sock. “Let’s see the results.”

“I’ll come with.” Soobin says.

Yeonjun frowns at him. Soobin can’t imagine why. _Well, I’m still half-asleep. Pretty much asleep. I can’t imagine anything right now._

“Fine.” Yeonjun bends over and plucks his jacket off the floor, shaking it out. “Let’s go, Beomgyu.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is brought to you by **Dumb Things Me and My College Roommate Have Tried Out In Our Dorm Room**. Toasters are great for making s’mores...and setting smoke detectors off and making the entire dorm evacuate for no good reason.


	14. Take Care

Beomgyu gives Yeonjun the ok symbol with one hand, holding onto a railing on the anteroom wall. He’s never been a big fan of zero gravity. He likes his feet on the ground and his insides in the right orientations. And his hair. _God, my hair._

Yeonjun opens the hatch to the _Charlie._

It’s pitch black inside, but Yeonjun just walks in anyway.

Beomgyu looks back at Soobin, who doesn’t look as ready to walk into complete darkness. _Like a normal fucking person._ Beomgyu flicks on the forehead flashlight of his exosuit before entering the ship.

He knows it’s his own ship, but seeing it all dark and abandoned like this is sending shivers down Beomgyu’s spine.

Beomgyu drags himself along handles on the wall until he finds the nearest control panel. He starts it up, selecting all of the ship’s nonessential functions.

“Wait.” Yeonjun says.

Beomgyu knows he could just reply, but he turns all the way at Yeonjun just to frown at him. Yeonjun’s dangling calmly from a handle on the ceiling. Maybe Yeonjun can see him in the glow from Beomgyu’s flashlight. Maybe not. Beomgyu doesn’t care. “Excuse me?”

“Let’s check the results first before doing anything.”

Beomgyu frowns harder. Maybe he’ll see it this time. “Surely we can do that with lights and air and, you know, _gravity_?”

“I don’t want to jeopardize the results in case it’s not actually finished,” Yeonjun says, throwing himself towards the stairwell. “We’d have to wait another couple of days if we had to restart the calculations.”

“Fine.” Beomgyu looks back at Soobin, who’s gripping a handle on the wall like his life depends on it. He reaches a hand out. “Come on.”

Soobin nods uneasily, taking Beomgyu’s hand.

“Where did you guys come from?” Ryujin asks when they return to the _Alpha_ ’s common area. She’s frying rice while Kai’s watching almost a dozen eggs boil.

“Our ship just finished the calculations.” Yeonjun says. “Emergency meeting in the bridge, now.”

“Now?” Ryujin uses her spatula to point down at the rice that isn’t quite finished frying.

“Yes, now.” Yeonjun says irritably.

“Can’t we have breakfast first?”

“No.”

“We should probably have breakfast first.” Soobin says.

Yeonjun frowns at him. “Every minute that we waste-”

“Let’s all have breakfast first.” Chaeryeong says. “We’ll need the energy.”

She gives Yeonjun a pointed look.

“Fine.” Yeonjun grumbles. “Let’s have breakfast.”

The breakfast is dead silent, and lasts all of five minutes. No one bothers brushing their teeth or combing their hair before heading up to the _Alpha_ ’s bridge.

Beomgyu and Yuna crouch over her station, going through the data they’d picked up from the _Charlie_ ’s computer.

“Oh.” Yuna gasps, leaning away from the screen. “That’s-”

“It’s not impossible.” Beomgyu says.

“No, it’s not.”

Yeonjun straightens up from where he’s standing by the door. “Engineers, report.”

“Here, we’re sharing it to everyone,” Beomgyu says.

Yuna nods. “Done.”

Yeonjun looks over Soobin’s shoulder as the latter opens the file.

Soobin turns his display to face Yeonjun. “You can come closer, you know.”

Yeonjun folds his arms, but takes a reluctant step closer as he scans the report.

Yeji’s the first to turn away from her station while Ryujin keeps reading. “Are you sure there’s been no mistake?”

“No, supercomputers don’t usually, you know,” Yuna makes a face. “Make mistakes.”

“I mean, it’s dealing with probabilities,” Beomgyu says. “Sometimes probabilities can be equal. Like flipping a coin.”

“Yes, but we’re not talking about _flipping a coin_ here.” Yeji says.

“Is there any other way to narrow it down?” Lia asks.

“Why are they so far from each other?” Taehyun asks.

“So where are we going?” Chaeryeong asks.

“Wait, what the hell is going on?” Kai asks.

Soobin looks up at Yeonjun, eyes wide.

_What are you looking at me like that for? You want me to do your job for you?_

Again _?_

Yeonjun rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t even have the time to be annoyed. “Engineers, please summarize the report for everyone present.”

“Yeah, sorry.” Beomgyu clears his throat. “The computer’s found three possible places that the _EXP Bravo_ might have ended up after exiting warp. Yuna?”

“They’re uh,” Yuna brings up a 3D projection of a map of the known universe. “These clusters: M6, M7, and M4.”

“It couldn’t get more specific than a _whole_ fucking cluster?” Lia asks.

“No.” Yuna makes a face. “The supercomputer’s not _that_ super.”

“Anyway,” Beomgyu continues. “They’re not likely to be in M4, since the probability is less than 0.0001%, but the trouble is that the probabilities for M6 and M7 are both nearly 50%.”

Soobin leans back in his seat, frowning. “Are they equal?”

“Yes.”

“Down to how many decimal places?” Yeji asks.

“Down to _all_ of them.” Beomgyu replies.

“They’re literally identical.” Yuna says.

“Actually,” Taehyun says. “Not so much.”

Yuna lifts an eyebrow. “What? They’re-”

“M7 houses a supermassive black hole, while the other one just seems to be all stars.” Taehyun says.

“But we still don’t know which cluster they actually ended up in.”

“It’s just something to think about,” Taehyun says. “The black hole.”

Chaeryeong sinks in her seat, which Kai had given up for her. He rests a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sure they aren’t-”

“We’re not sure about anything.” Yeonjun says. “Which is why we should split up and investigate one cluster each.”

“We can’t risk losing anyone else.” Soobin says. “If we go to a cluster, we go there together.”

“That’s not efficient.” Yeonjun says.

“Maybe not, but wouldn’t you rather have backup on a rescue mission?”

“I would rather get it done as soon as possible.”

“What’s a crew of five going to do against-”

“We don’t even know if there’s anyone responsible for-”

“We don’t know anything! Which is why we shouldn’t take any chances-”

“The whole point of going to both clusters is that we _won’t_ be taking chances-”

“Boys.” Yeji cuts in.

Yeonjun and Soobin lower their heads in embarrassment.

Yeji stands up, straightening her crumpled jacket up as much as she can. “Come on, everyone, let’s give the captains a moment to come to a decision. We’ve got a lot to clean up downstairs.”

Ryujin hops to her feet, while the engineers and navigators trudge over slowly, like they’re being possessed. Kai offers a hand to help Chaeryeong up, but she waves it away, standing on her own.

“We’ll be finished cleaning up in ten minutes, don’t you think, Ryujin?” Yeji asks loudly, not once looking at the captains.

“Wha- Uh, yeah, I guess so.”

Yeji still doesn’t look at them as she walks to the door. “Ten minutes.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Soobin says, before frowning at himself.

“We’ll get it done.” Yeonjun mutters.

Their crew shuffle out of the bridge after Yeji, the last two being Chaeryeong and Kai.

Yeonjun doesn’t look away even after the door slides shut. He can’t imagine what Chaeryeong’s feeling right now. He doesn’t even know how he’s feeling right now.

All he knows is that he has to get this right, he owes Chaeryeong and Bang Chan and everyone else _that_ much.

Yeonjun scowls at Soobin. _He wouldn’t understand._

“You’re not going to change your mind in the next ten minutes, are you?” Soobin asks quietly.

“No.”

“I know you’re thinking about the crew of the _Bravo_ ,” Soobin says. “But you have to think about your own crew.”

“I am.” Yeonjun says tensely. “How dare you-”

“I’m not saying you don’t care about your crew. I’m saying we need to minimize the risks we expose them to.” Soobin purses his lips. “It’s just safer to travel together. Ten of us instead of just five.”

“But then we’d have to choose between two identical probabilities.” Yeonjun says.

“We will.”

Yeonjun takes a deep breath, folding his arms. “Are you ready to live with the consequences if you make the wrong choice?”

“Yes.”

Yeonjun frowns at him. _What’s wrong with him?_

“I’ll have done the best I could do for them,” Soobin says. “And for my own crew.”

“That’s not enough.” Yeonjun says. “We have to rescue them. We have to get it done.”

“But what if we can’t?”

“We will.” Yeonjun hears his heart beating in his ears. He hasn’t been this angry at another person in a long time. “We can’t quit before we even try.”

“I’m not quitting, I’m just being realistic-”

“My crew and I are going to M7.” Yeonjun says, setting his jaw as he takes a few steps closer. “It’s up to you if you want to follow us, or if you want to do the right thing and go to M6.”

Soobin glares up at him, gripping his armrests. “Some choice that is.”

“There’s a right answer, Soobin, don’t be difficult-”

“ _I’m_ being difficult?” Soobin stands up. “ _You’re_ the one who won’t fucking listen to me-”

“Because you’re wrong, and I’m right, and it isn’t even about that, I’m going to go save my friend-”

“But what if you _can’t_? What if you just put yourself and your crew in more danger-”

“I _won’t_!” Yeonjun shouts, feeling his own breath bounce back off Soobin’s face.

Soobin closes his eyes, brows furrowed together in frustration.

“I’m sorry.” Yeonjun mutters, though he isn’t, really. “But I’m going to do what I have to do. You do whatever you want, like you always do.”

He turns to leave, but Soobin catches him by the arm.

“You think I just do whatever I want all the time?” Soobin’s voice is strangely low.

Yeonjun shrugs his hand off and stares him right in the eye. “Tell me I’m wrong.”

“You are.” Soobin’s breaths are getting heavier. “You have no idea how little say I have in anything I do.”

“So what, you want to try it out now?” Yeonjun scowls. “The crew of the _Bravo_ deserve better than your-”

“Why don’t you make any _sense_?” Soobin cries out, shoving Yeonjun.

Yeonjun loses his footing and stumbles back, not because Soobin’s actually that strong, but because he surprised him. “W- What do you mean?”

“You act like you care about your crew, but then you lead them straight into danger-”

“We don’t even know if it’s really that dangerous-”

“And you act like you care about _me_ ,” Soobin scoffs. “Only to treat me like _this_.”

Yeonjun takes a step back, glaring at Soobin. “I’m not about to treat you differently just because-”

“But you do!”

Yeonjun frowns at Soobin for a very, very long time. “I don’t care about you… more than other people.”

“Do you think I’m stupid, Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun won’t say the truth, so he doesn’t say anything at all.

Soobin starts laughing, but his smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “That’s why you won’t listen to anything I have to say? I know I’m not as smart as you, but I’m not… I’m not always wrong.”

Soobin’s eyes are glistening more than usual. Yeonjun realizes that it’s because tears are collecting on his lower lashes.

Soobin blinks, sending two tears rolling down his cheeks.

Yeonjun hates himself in that moment. He hates himself so much that he cradles Soobin’s face in his hands and pulls him in for a kiss.

Soobin’s arms tense up in surprise.

“I’m sorry.” Yeonjun mumbles, staggering backward until he hits the wall. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-”

“You’d better have.” Soobin says, pinning Yeonjun against the wall with another kiss.

Yeonjun rests his hands on Soobin’s chest to push him away, but he never does. Soobin kisses him harder, slamming Yeonjun’s back into the wall again.

Soobin’s fingers trace the edges of Yeonjun’s face, climbing until they bury themselves in Yeonjun’s hair. His lips are like marshmallows against Yeonjun’s, so soft that Yeonjun can hardly feel anything but Soobin’s breath in his mouth and tug on his hair.

Yeonjun’s hands slide up to cup Soobin’s cheeks, brushing against his earlobes.

The door slides open.

“Captain Kim?”

Soobin’s taken a step back, tucking his hands behind his back like he’s at a funeral. All the color from his cheeks has subsided. “Yes, Dr. Jung?”

Yeonjun’s flattened against the wall, panting like he’d just swum thirty laps. He doesn’t know how Soobin can act like nothing happened so quickly, or how he feels about it. It’s like he doesn’t know anything at all.

“Pilot Hwang would like to know what your decision is.” If Kai saw anything, his face doesn’t give it away.

“I…” Soobin looks at Yeonjun just then. “Yeonjun?”

There’s something pleading in his look that makes Yeonjun’s heaving chest ache.

Yeonjun clears his throat, quickly brushing his hair back in order. “We’ll be going to the M7 cluster.” He coughs out.

“Together?” Soobin asks.

Yeonjun’s voice doesn’t fail him this time. “No.”

Soobin doesn’t look away from Yeonjun, his eyebrows furrowing slowly as he says, “Tell the crew to get ready to disengage the link-up with the _Charlie_.”

“Yes, Captain.” Kai nods, leaving the bridge as suddenly as he’d arrived.

Yeonjun straightens up his jacket, turning to the door. “You’re going to M6?”

“Yes.” Soobin’s voice is flat and emotionless.

“Good.” Yeonjun pushes the button to open the bridge door. He pauses in the doorway, turning to find Soobin staring at him with a look he just can’t decipher.

“Take care.” Soobin says.

“You too.”

Yeonjun grips the armrests of his seat as the _EXP Charlie_ jerks forward with a loud, metallic clang.

“Disengagement successful, Captain.” Beomgyu calls from his station, turning to look at Yeonjun strangely.

Yeonjun wouldn’t be surprised if Beomgyu managed to wring everything out of the _Alpha_ ’s medical officer in the ten minutes it took for them to move back to their ship. Because of that, Yeonjun looks straight out the windshield like he can’t even see Beomgyu. “Good work, Beomgyu. Ryujin-”

“Get us out of here, I got you,” Ryujin gives him the sloppiest salute in human history before taking the controls in both hands.

The ship accelerates forwards so smoothly that the only indication that they’re moving is the changing view in the windshield. The dull gray asteroids up ahead seem to move respectfully out of the way of the _Charlie_.

Yeonjun opens up a copy of their flight plan to the M7 cluster. He’s committed it to memory, but he looks again, just to be sure.

“Warp generator’s on standby, Cap-” Beomgyu visibly stops himself, swallowing in the middle of his sentence. “Captain.”

“Thanks.” Yeonjun closes the flight plan and looks ahead. “Let’s launch the warp when we clear that asteroid at 0600.”

“Got it, Captain.” Ryujin nods, easing the ship in a gentle arc around the asteroid.

The ship finds itself facing darkness speckled with little glints of light. Yeonjun leans back in his seat. The stars are comforting, even though he knows it’s an entirely different view from the one he had back on the Moon.

Ryujin rests one hand on the thruster, glancing over at Beomgyu.

Beomgyu turns to Yeonjun. “Should we go into warp now, Captain?”

“Just a minute.” Yeonjun says. “Taehyun, can we send out a transmission?”

Ryujin and Beomgyu lift their eyebrows at each other.

“Yes, Captain.” Taehyun nods. “Addressed to whom?”

“The _EXP Bravo_.”

Chaeryeong turns in her seat, frowning at Yeonjun.

Yeonjun clears his throat as he presses the record button.

“This is Captain Choi Yeonjun of the _EXP_ _Charlie_ …” Yeonjun says. Then he shakes his head and deletes that recording, starting a new one. “Hi Chan, it’s Yeonjun. I hope you guys are doing all right. We’ll be there in 23 hours – If you’re in the M7 cluster, that is. If you’re in M6, the _EXP Alpha_ will probably be there in roughly the same time.”

He glances at Chaeryeong, whose usually bright eyes have grown sunken and deep in the past few days.

“Whatever the case, help is coming,” Yeonjun says. “See you and your crew in a while, Chan.”

Yeonjun ends the recording, sending it over to Taehyun’s station. “That’s all, thank you.”

Taehyun types in the other ship’s roaming address. “Sent, Captain.”

“Thanks.” Yeonjun leans back in his seat. His heart is racing, and he can feel it against his seat’s tough cushions. “Ryujin, Beomgyu, please begin warp warmup protocol.”

“Yes, Captain.” Ryujin says, pushing on the thruster to bring the ship’s speed up.

Beomgyu stares at Yeonjun for a long time.

“Beomgyu.” Yeonjun says sharply. “That was an order.”

“Yes, Captain.” Beomgyu turns to his screen quickly. “Warp generator ramping up.”

“Chaeryeong,” Yeonjun says.

Chaeryeong takes an extra second to respond. “Y- Yes, Captain?”

“We’ll be there soon.” Yeonjun says. “We’ll bring them all home.”

Chaeryeong tucks her face into her hands, nodding.

A myriad of colors takes over the ship’s windshield as it jumps into the warp dimension.


	15. Black Hole

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun unclips his seatbelt, climbing out of his chair.

He leans on the rails of his raised dais, looking out over the crew on the bridge below.

_I’m asleep? When did I fall asleep?_

How _could I fall asleep now?_

Yeonjun frowns, trying to force himself to wake up. It only brings on this high-pitched ringing in his ears.

He winces, but he’s so used to it at this point that he can pretty much manage the pain.

“Yeonjun? Are you all right?”

Yeonjun turns to Soobin, who leans on the railing next to him. Only then does he realize that Soobin’s wearing a navy blue Fleet pilot’s uniform, not a gray captain’s uniform. _How many times have I had this dream? And I’m only seeing this now?_

“Yeah. It’s just a headache.” Yeonjun says.

“Maybe you should get some rest.”

“I’m fine.”

“Okay.”

Yeonjun smiles at the Soobin his subconscious has come up with. It’s hardly Kim Soobin. This thing, whatever it is, is bland, helpful, and seems to agree with everything Yeonjun says.

_Still, why him?_ Yeonjun asks his own subconscious. _You could’ve given me anyone else to occupy my dreams. Literally anyone else would’ve been fine._

Soobin smiles back. “What’re you thinking about?”

“Nothing.” Yeonjun admits.

Soobin grins, hooking one finger in Yeonjun’s pocket to slide him closer. “ _You_? Not thinking of anything? As if.”

Yeonjun frowns.

Soobin slips a hand into Yeonjun’s back pocket. “What’s going on?”

“B- Behave.” Yeonjun sputters out, flicking Soobin’s hand away. “We’re on the bridge.”

_Why is he acting like this? What’s going on? Why would I ever_ want _-_

“Oh come on, _Captain_ , no one’s looking,” Soobin smirks. “You gave them all too much work.”

Yeonjun just frowns back at him. _Why is he starting to act like… the real Soobin?_

Soobin’s eyes widen suddenly, focusing on the windshield just beyond the mezzanine. “What’s that?”

Yeonjun shuts his eyes. _At least it’s coming to an end. Whatever this dream was._

Soobin grabs Yeonjun’s arm. “Y- Yeonjun, what-”

Yeonjun doesn’t open his eyes, but he feels the darkness wash over him until he can’t feel anything anymore.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Captain.” Beomgyu’s voice is strangely gentle.

Yeonjun opens his eyes. He’s still strapped into his captain’s chair, but he’s slouched over while he was asleep. He wipes his mouth off on the cuff of his sleeve instinctively before looking up at whoever woke him up. “How much time until we leave warp-”

He notices the view outside the windshield. The colors of the warp tunnel are all gone.

“None.” Beomgyu says, scuffing one boot on the floor. “I handled everything. Sorry.”

“N- No, don’t be.” Yeonjun looks around. Chaeryeong and Ryujin are gone, but Taehyun’s busy at his station, reviewing something in text too small for Yeonjun to read from this far away. “Where are the other two?”

“Ryujin’s making dinner- breakfast- whatever.” Beomgyu frowns. “Chaeryeong’s asleep.”

“Good.” Yeonjun unclips his seat belt and stands up, cracking his neck and back.

“Sorry we didn’t bring you down to your bed,” Beomgyu says. “We couldn’t.”

“It’s all right.” Yeonjun stops and studies Beomgyu’s face for a second. _Why is he behaving like this?_

_He knows, doesn’t he?_

_Does he feel bad for me? How dare he-_

“We just got out of warp, actually. I started a broad scan for the _Bravo_ ,” Beomgyu says. “And Taehyun’s trying to contact the nearest Fleet outpost.”

Yeonjun opens his mouth to say something, but he realizes he has nothing to say. That’s exactly what he would’ve asked them to do, anyway.

_Maybe Beomgyu’s a better captain than I am,_ Yeonjun thinks in mild horror.

“I’ll let you know when the results come in, Captain.”

“Beomgyu.” Yeonjun says, more abruptly than he intended to. “Did Dr. Jung tell you anything?”

“About what?” Beomgyu blinks at Yeonjun. His round eyes seem to be so devoid of ulterior motives that it scares Yeonjun a little bit.

Yeonjun shakes his head. “Nothing. Sorry.”

“Your soup’s cold.” Ryujin says.

Chaeryeong looks down at the bowl, nodding slowly.

Ryujin stacks her empty bowl along with Yeonjun, Beomgyu, and Taehyun’s, dumping them into the dishwasher.

Beomgyu holds Chaeryeong’s spoon out to her. “Chaeryeong-”

“I’m not hungry, sorry.” Chaeryeong says. “Thanks anyway, guys.”

Ryujin stalls there, standing next to the table. “I’ll put it in the fridge for later?”

“Okay.” Chaeryeong smiles at Ryujin, but it’s a forced, overly wide smile.

Yeonjun reaches out and squeezes Chaeryeong’s hand. “We’re nearly-”

Taehyun jumps to his feet. His watch is pulsating bright green. “The scan’s finished.”

Yeonjun’s barely sat in his chair when he says, “Taehyun, report.”

The others click their seatbelts on, logging into their stations as quickly as they can.

“We…” Taehyun gasps.

“Taehyun, report.” Yeonjun says again.

“We found them.” Taehyun says brightly. “They’re on the outer rim of the cluster. Drawing up a flight plan now.”

“Thank you, Taehyun.” Yeonjun scans through the results of the scan. He didn’t think they’d find them this easily, or that they’d even be lucky enough to be in the right cluster, but he figured it was about time that things became easier for them.

Chaeryeong’s the only one not going through the results of the scan.

Yeonjun looks away from her. Just looking at her seems to sap away his energy. _Not that it’s her fault. It’s not her fault._

“Flight should be… length of 2 hours.” Taehyun says, frowning as he seems to work out the right words like a math problem. “2 hours long.”

Beomgyu swivels around in his chair. “We’ll be there in fifteen minutes if we warp the entire way.”

“We just got out of warp,” Yeonjun says. “It’s dangerous to warp again so quickly after-”

“I left the warp generator on standby.” Beomgyu says. “I didn’t run cooldown protocol.”

Taehyun stands up in alarm. “It’s been running _this whole time_?”

Beomgyu ignores him. “I can get us there in fifteen minutes, Captain.”

Yeonjun doesn’t know what to say. He knows for a fact that leaving the warp generator on standby for too long could’ve caused the entire ship to implode. _But it didn’t._

Beomgyu is scaring him more than ever.

“Do it.” Chaeryeong says.

They turn to her slowly.

Taehyun swallows. “The captain has to approve it.”

“Do it.” Yeonjun echoes, his mouth feeling numb. “We’ll warp all the way there.”

“What if we need to warp somewhere else afterward?” Taehyun asks.

“We’ll have to wait.” Ryujin says.

Yeonjun grips his armrests. Taehyun’s right. If for any reason they have to warp away as soon as they get there, they probably won’t be able to without risking implosion.

Chaeryeong’s just staring at him, her eyes dead set and unblinking.

Yeonjun sighs. He knew what he was getting into when he signed up for the Captain major. But he didn’t think it would be like _this_.

“We’ll do it.” Yeonjun says. “Beomgyu, Ryujin, prepare to enter warp.”

“Yes, sir.”

“On it, Captain.”

Yeonjun looks at the navigator, whose shoulders sag as he turns back to his station with a frown. “Taehyun, I want you to keep trying to contact the _Bravo_.”

“Yes, Captain.”

Yeonjun settles back into his seat, adjusting his seat belt. It automatically adjusts around him, but it feels like it’s choking him just now.

“Exiting warp in T minus 5 minutes.” Beomgyu says gently, barely above a whisper. “Warp generator cooldown sequence starting now.”

Yeonjun clears his throat. It’s dry and rough, like the time he’d taken a field trip to the desert near his dome. “Taehyun, how close are we going to be to the supermassive black hole?”

“Still within safe orbiting range, Captain.”

“Ryujin, get ready to adjust for the gravitational pull.” Yeonjun says.

“Yes, Captain.”

Yeonjun grips his armrests as the timer in the corner of their windshield ticks down to zero. No one in the bridge says anything, or even seems to breathe.

The dark circle at the end of the multicolored warp tunnel expands, slowly filling the breadth of their view as the brightly colored lights streaking across the tunnel walls fade away.

The ship leaps out of the comfortable hum of warp, but not into darkness. The light flooding in through the windshield is painfully bright at first, like the sun on a hot day.

Then the windshield automatically adjusts, dimming the tint until the source of light is clear. The ship is facing a distant object surrounded by a halo of near-white light.

Looking past the white light, Yeonjun can just barely make out a deep, flat darkness.

It makes the tips of his fingers tingle numbly.

_Or perhaps I’ve been holding the armrests too tightly._ Yeonjun tries to relax his grip, but his hands don’t seem to comply.

“Entering orbit,” Ryujin says, taking the controls.

Yeonjun swallows, but his throat is still dry. “Taehyun-”

“The _EXP Bravo_ should be, uh…” Taehyun frowns at his screen. “Oh. It’s behind us.”

“Turning the ship around.” Ryujin says, easing the ship into a gentle U-turn.

Yeonjun closes his eyes while the ship turns, only opening them when the view’s steady again. The tint of the windshield is too dark for him to see anything. Even the distant stars are barely visible.

“They should be uh, straight ahead.” Taehyun says, crouching over the holo-lidar display at his station.

“Beomgyu, use the front cameras.” Yeonjun says.

“On it, Captain.” Beomgyu says, typing frantically. “Adjusting for the visual noise from the black hole.”

A digital feed of the view up ahead washes over the screen.

Sure enough, there’s a small, bulbous shape in the distance.

Yeonjun’s heart catches in his throat. “Ryujin-”

Ryujin pushes on the thruster, not bothering to ease into it. The ship jumps forward, speeding towards the round figure in the distance.

The light from the black hole glints off the smooth surface of the _EXP Bravo._

_But something’s wrong._

“Beomgyu, enhance the image.”

“Yes, Captain.”

The image from the front camera zooms in on the other ship.

The windshield of the _Bravo_ is facing them, with the sharp shine of its privacy filter being at maximum strength. The white exterior of the ship frames the windshield, but comes to an abrupt stop just below it.

Yeonjun stares at the image of the stars beyond, where the rest of the ship ought to be.

The _Charlie_ ’s stopped accelerating, drifting slightly off course as the image of the _Bravo_ , or what’s left of it, veers towards the corner of the screen.

“Ryujin, bring us closer.” Yeonjun says, but the pilot’s bent over her station, face buried in her hands.

Yeonjun unclips his seatbelt, stepping out of his chair. He gently turns Ryujin away as he bends over her controls, directing the ship back on track. “Taehyun, send out an SOS.”

He stops and turns to the navigator, who’s staring at the screen in open-mouthed horror.

“Taehyun-”

“I’ll do it.” Beomgyu unclips his seatbelt and walks over to Taehyun’s station. “Let me know when to start recording.”

Yeonjun grips the controls of the ship, but his hands are shaking. He frowns at them until they steady themselves. “Start recording.”

“Yes, Captain.” Beomgyu hits the start button on Taehyun’s station.

Yeonjun clears his throat.

_“This is Captain Choi Yeonjun of the EXP Charlie.”_ Yeonjun’s voice takes a staggering breath in the recording. _“We are requesting immediate assistance from any Fleet ship within the area. Beomgyu, please attach our coordinates to the message.”_

_“Done, Captain.”_

_“Thank you.”_ Yeonjun’s voice is hoarse. “ _We have recovered a part of the EXP Bravo, just- Just the bridge. We will conduct a search for sur-_ ” Yeonjun coughs. “ _Please send help. Please.”_

“Chaeryeong, I’m just going to borrow your med kit, okay?”

Chaeryeong nods slowly. She barely feels Beomgyu unclip the kit from her belt. She barely feels the blanket someone puts around her shoulders. She barely feels it when Yeonjun carries her down to her bed-shelf.

She feels like she’s watching a movie as she watches him brush her hair out of her eyes.

“Take it easy, okay?” Yeonjun says, one hand on the curtain of her bed-shelf. “Beomgyu will be here if you need anything.”

Chaeryeong doesn’t reply, so he just pulls her curtain closed.

She doesn’t close her eyes, because she doesn’t want to fall asleep.

She doesn’t think she can.

Just the same, she stares up at the top of her bed-shelf. She’d stuck all these things up there to comfort herself, but they’re not doing anything for her now.

She reaches up and peels one of the photos off the ceiling.

She folds it half, then in half again.

Chaeryeong tucks it under her pillow.

She squeezes her eyes shut, feeling her tears soak right into the thin fabric of her pillow.

Beomgyu looks up when the door to the bridge slides open.

“I’ve got it secured in the tow field.” Beomgyu says.

Yeonjun’s just leaning against the closed door, looking out at the image of the fraction of the _Bravo_ in the windshield display.

“How are the others?” Beomgyu asks.

Yeonjun’s still staring at the windshield.

“Captain.” Beomgyu says, frowning. “Yeonjun.”

“Yes? Sorry.” Yeonjun shakes his head. “What were you saying?”

“How are the others doing?”

“They’re resting.” Yeonjun says. “Ryujin and Taehyun are asleep.”

“Chaeryeong?”

Yeonjun just shakes his head.

Beomgyu sighs. He sets everything on autopilot, then turns away from his station. “I did a scan for their trackers.”

Yeonjun’s shoulders heave. “What did you find?”

“Nothing.”

Yeonjun takes a breath. “We still have to check.”

“ _I’m_ going to check.” Beomgyu says. “You’re staying here to operate the tether.”

“No. I’ll go out.”

“Yeonjun, you’re not in any state-”

“I’ve had more training in spacewalks.”

“I don’t care.” Beomgyu walks past Yeonjun, opening the door to the bridge. He’s about to leave the bridge when Yeonjun grabs him by the arm. Beomgyu can’t shake himself free, he knows it, so he glares up at Yeonjun. “You might’ve been able to bully Kim Soobin into doing what you want, but it’s not going to work on me.”

Yeonjun lets go of his arm.

“I’ve set up the comms already.” Beomgyu says. “Give me a minute to get into my exosuit-”

“Beomgyu.”

“What?”

“Please let me do it.” Yeonjun’s voice is so soft it makes Beomgyu’s spine tingle. “If there’s anything out there, I don’t want you to get hurt.”

Beomgyu looks away. His brow furrows as he tries to come up with something to say to that, but he just can’t seem to.

“Also,” Yeonjun lowers his voice further, his mouth curling a funny way. “I never learned how to man the tether.”

“You…” Beomgyu closes his eyes as he tries to process that. _Choi Yeonjun, perfect human being, has no confidence doing something as simple as reeling a fucking tether in?_ “Are you serious?”

Yeonjun stares at him, ears reddening in embarrassment. _Oh fuck, he is._

Yeonjun slips a set of magnetic gloves over his exosuit, testing them against the walls of the _Charlie’_ s anteroom. His hands cling to the wall before he can even resist. He switches the gloves off.

“Mag gloves working?” Beomgyu asks over the comms.

“Yeah.”

“Test the boots.”

Yeonjun presses a button to activate the magnetic soles in his exosuit. He can’t lift his feet off the metal alloy floor. He switches it off again so he can walk. “They’re working.”

“Good. You’ve got your helmet on?”

“Secured, yes.”

“I’m depressurizing the chamber and dropping the artificial gravity,” Beomgyu says. “Hold onto something.”

Yeonjun closes a fist around one of the handles on the wall. “Ok.”

He feels a rush of wind as his body begins to grow lighter and lighter, until his feet lift off the floor.

“Okay, you can open the door now.” Beomgyu’s breath crackles over the comms. “Be careful.”

“I will.” Yeonjun undoes the hatch at the end of the chamber, swinging it open until it fits into a latch on the wall.

The light from the black hole floods in, blinding him for a moment before his helmet’s visor adjusts, dimming down until he can open his eyes comfortably again.

Yeonjun checks the buckles on his harness an eighth time. Then he feels for the carbon fiber cable tether snaking out from the back of his harness, an eighth time as well.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Any volunteers?”

Yeonjun raised his hand. His classmates let out semi-amused scoffs.

“Of course, Yeonjun, come on up,” Instructor Jung said. “You know how to put on an exosuit?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Of course.” Instructor Jung had laughed as he handed Yeonjun a neon orange exosuit. “Question: Why are the exosuits orange?”

“Because it’s easily detected by the human eye, sir.” Yeonjun replied as he zipped up the back of his suit. Then he noticed that Instructor Jung and half his classmates were giving him weird looks. The said half of his classmates had their hands raised.

“I was asking the rest of the class, but thanks anyway, Yeonjun.” Instructor Jung muttered.

Yeonjun nodded graciously before slipping his helmet on.

“Now, I don’t know if you guys saw it on the way here, but the outside of this training facility is covered in rungs, like the beginner climbing walls back in the Academy gym.” Instructor Jung tapped a panel on the wall. The opaque white shimmered away reveal a view of one wing of extralunar training facility. The wing was wide at its base and, as the instructor had mentioned, was dotted with multicolored rungs. The wing tapered to a point some five hundred meters away, with the rungs growing more sparsely spread out the closer they got to the tip. At the very tip of the wing was a glowing red light. “You guys see that red light over there? That’s a button, actually, and the goal of the exercise is to hit that button.”

“Is there a time limit?” Yeonjun asked. Some of his classmates laughed, but he ignored them, of course.

“No, there’s no time limit, but just bear in mind that everyone’s going to have a turn.” Instructor Jung had said. “The sooner you all press that button, the sooner we can get back to solid ground.”

Yeonjun nodded.

“These are the spacewalk harnesses,” Instructor Jung said, opening a panel in the wall. “They’re the only thing that will keep you from floating off into space, so you’ve got to make sure everything’s secured how many times before stepping off the ship?”

“Five times.” Yeonjun replied.

His classmates who’d bothered to raise their hands groaned.

Instructor Jung gave them a sympathetic look, but nodded in Yeonjun’s direction just the same. “That’s right, you need to check all six buckles and the three connections to the tether itself a total of five times _before_ you step out for the space walk. Got it?”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun doesn’t know why, but he always braces himself before stepping out into space. He always anticipates it to be a rush of coldness, like when you dive into a 20-foot deep pool, but the exosuit keeps his body at this dull, slightly-below-lukewarm temperature.

Yeonjun pushes a button on the wall. His tethering cable’s transferred to outside the ship, so he can safely close the hatch behind him.

He turns around on the narrow ledge, facing what remains of the _EXP Bravo_. Seeing it on the ship’s screen had already turned his stomach, but now that he can see the torn edge of the ship’s exterior, wrinkled and ragged as if it were nothing more than a piece of paper, his knees buckle slightly.

“Oh god.” Beomgyu’s voice comes over the comms. _He’s probably watching my video feed._

“I’ll try to board the- the _ship_ now,” Yeonjun says, licking his dry lips. He knows exosuit maintains humidity at a comfortable 40%, but his mouth feels like it’s full of sand.

He uses his hands to anchor himself on both sides of the doorway as he bends his knees, preparing to jump.

His knees shake.

Yeonjun shuts his eyes, taking deep breaths as he tries to force his knees to be steady.

“You don’t have to do it, Yeonjun. You can come back in-”

Yeonjun lets go of the doorway and jumps off.

He glides through the space between the two ships, feeling nothing but the gentle backward tug from the weight of his tethering cable.

He manages to grab onto a lifted edge in the ship’s exterior panels, holding himself steady as he switches the magnetic gloves on. He switches his magnetic soles on as well, letting him crawl along the crumpled exterior.

He pauses right over the giant letters _EX_ , just before the torn edge. The metal is curled and jagged, the exposed inner layers glinting in the light from the black hole. He knows how much force these ships – even these practice microships – are built to withstand. _What could have possibly done this?_

“Try not to touch the edge.” Beomgyu says. “It might damage the exosuit.”

“I won’t.” Yeonjun says. He starts crawling all along the edge, looking for somewhere safe he can probably swing himself around on.

He finds a short stretch near the top of the ship, only half a meter or so long, where the edge is crumpled like the rest of it, but strangely flat.

He puts a hand tentatively on it, trying to feel it through all his layers of gloves.

It’s got the bumpy texture of welded metal.

Yeonjun frowns.

“What’s going on?”

“I’ll swing myself over here.”

“Okay. Be careful.”

Yeonjun nods, though Beomgyu can’t see it. He grabs onto the strangely flat edge and, releasing his magnetic soles from the surface of the ship, somersaults and swings himself right into the ship’s exposed stairwell.

Most of the steps are gone, but Yeonjun’s able to grab onto one of them, looping one arm over it like a drowning man might hold onto a piece of driftwood.

He looks down. The landing where the stairs lead into the ship’s common area is gone, along with the entire common area and engine room. All Yeonjun can see are stars.

His stomach turns.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes.” Yeonjun pulls himself up until he can land his magnetic soles on the top step of the stairs.

He braces himself with one magnetic glove on the wall as he faces the door to the _Bravo’_ s bridge.

The door is crumpled and misaligned, giving him tiny glimpses into the darkness within the room.

Yeonjun reaches out with his free hand and tries pulling it open.

It doesn’t make a sound, obviously, but he feels the vibration as the door remains stuck.

He tries again, grunting as he pulls harder.

The door only budges an inch.

“Yeonjun, you don’t have to- You don’t have to look inside,” Beomgyu’s voice is shaking. “Please just stop and come back, Yeonjun, you’d done enough-”

“You can stop watching the feed.”

“No, I’m not going to, just please don’t open that door, Yeonjun. Please.”

Yeonjun anchors one hand against the wall again, reaching for the control panel at his waist with the other.

_Disable live video feed?_ The hologram asks him.

He clicks _Yes._

“Yeonjun!” Beomgyu screams over the comms. “What are you doing! Yeonjun! Stop! Come back here! Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun turns the volume down to 0, taking a deep breath. Then he switches his magnetic soles off, feeling his feet lift off the top step of the stairs.

He grips one edge of the door, turning onto his side as he activates his magnetic gloves.

Then he looks down and aims his feet at a distant wall.

_This might just rip the exosuit. It might not work._

Yeonjun tries not to think about that.

He closes his eyes and switches his magnetic soles back on.

They immediately get tugged towards the other wall, but Yeonjun’s hands are securely curled around the edge of the door. He hears a pop from one shoulder, but none from the other. He can vaguely feel his limbs being torn away from each other, but he keeps holding on, his hands and feet being pulled away from each other by the magnetic soles on his boots.

The door creaks.

Yeonjun shuts his eyes, trying to think of anything but the pain he’s putting himself through.

The door lets out a loud groan as it slides half-open.

Yeonjun switches his magnetic soles off. He goes back to floating listlessly above the top step, both hands still curled around the edge of the door.

He tries to right himself, but his left shoulder doesn’t seem to listen to him.

Yeonjun frowns down at it. Even under the relatively thick exosuit, the shape of it looks wrong.

He tries lifting his left arm, wincing from the pain.

He shuts his eyes and takes a few deep breaths.

Then he reaches up with his left arm, behind his head, to touch his opposite shoulder. He keeps pushing until he hears another loud pop.

Yeonjun dangles from the door by his right hand, panting as he tries to catch his breath. His forehead’s slick with sweat, and sweat’s soaking the back of his t-shirt inside the suit.

The pain in his shoulder recedes to a dull ache. _Good._

Yeonjun puts his left hand back onto the edge of the door, using both arms to pull himself into the bridge.

Yeonjun finds himself in near pitch darkness. He secures his feet to the floor using his magnetic soles before switching his headlamp on.

He looks around the darkened bridge.

_No._

Yeonjun drops to his knees.


	16. Sedated

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> big ole warning for this one... very heavy chapter

Beomgyu watched Yeonjun’s heart rate spike on his screen. “Yeonjun! Yeonjun!”

_It’s no use. The motherfucker probably put me on mute._

He chewed on his lip. _What can I do? What can I even-_

“Beomgyu?”

Beomgyu jumped up in his chair. “Hello? Yes? Yeonjun? What’s happening? Wh-”

“Can you pull me back in now?”

“Of course.” Beomgyu opened the controls for the tether. “Have you made your way around sharp edge-”

“Yes, please pull me in now. Please.”

“I’m on it.” Beomgyu started drawing in Yeonjun’s tether. Then he transferred the controls to Taehyun’s watch (which he may or may not have removed while helping the navigator downstairs) as he ran out of the bridge.

He climbed into an exosuit and entered the anteroom before depressurizing it.

Beomgyu clung to a railing on the wall, using Taehyun’s watch to reel Yeonjun’s tether in until he couldn’t reel it in anymore.

The hatch across the chamber swung open.

Yeonjun floated in, trying and failing to grab one of the handrails.

Beomgyu flung himself across the chamber, catching Yeonjun in his arms. He reached for the switch for Yeonjun’s magnetic soles, securing the captain on the floor of the anteroom before he swung himself to go and close the hatch.

Beomgyu brought the air and gravity in the anteroom back up to normal.

Yeonjun swayed on his feet, so Beomgyu stepped in to catch him. He’d underestimated how heavy Yeonjun was with the exosuit and harness, so they fell in a heap on the floor.

“Yeonjun,” Beomgyu crawled out from under the captain and unclasped his own helmet first before Yeonjun’s. He placed one hand in front of Yeonjun’s nose and mouth.

Yeonjun’s breath brushed weakly against his palm.

Beomgyu let out a sigh of relief, turning Yeonjun onto his side. “What happened? What did you see?”

Yeonjun shook his head, staring straight ahead and not at Beomgyu.

“Can you get up? I can’t carry you inside,” Beomgyu said, slinging one of Yeonjun’s arms over his shoulder. “Come on, Chaeryeong’s got to have a look at you-”

“Chaeryeong.” Yeonjun said quietly.

“Yeah, she’s awake now, I’ll get her to check you-” Beomgyu frowned at the fist Yeonjun was holding out to him. “What’s that?”

Yeonjun opened his gloved hand. There’s something crumpled inside.

Beomgyu shrugged the top half of his exosuit off to pick it up with his bare hands. It’s a photograph.

He ironed the photograph out on one knee.

“Oh no.” Beomgyu blinked, feeling tears roll down his cheeks.

Chaeryeong laughed at him in the photograph, holding up a popsicle that’s melted all over her hand.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Chaeryeong wakes up to a gentle chime.

The light from outside her window streaks in through the thin curtains, drawing lines across her face.

She turns to find her sister holding her phone.

“I turned off your alarm.” Her sister says.

Chaeryeong just nods.

Then her phone starts chiming again, buzzing in her sister’s hand.

Her sister frowns at it.

“What is it?” Chaeryeong asks.

Her sister hands her the phone.

Chaeryeong rubs her eyes and squints at the screen.

_Graduation tomorrow!_ 🌼

She closes the notification and places the phone face down on her bedside table. _I should’ve deleted that. I should’ve deleted everything._

The door to the bedroom creaks open. “Chae- Oh, Chaeryeong, you’re awake. Um… Breakfast is on the table.”

Chaeryeong nods.

Chaeryeong’s older sister reaches in and grabs their youngest sister by the sleeve. “Stop bothering her.”

“I wasn’t bothering her! I was just turning her alarm off-”

“Leave her alone!” Chaeryeong’s older sister hisses, closing the bedroom door gently behind the two of them.

Chaeryeong can still hear them arguing in the hallway, but she doesn’t bother listening in. She sits up, crouched under her younger sister’s bunk above her bed. She pulls the curtain back and looks out onto the rolling hills behind their house, bright green in the dome’s lights above.

She didn’t have dreams last night. She hasn’t had any dreams she can remember in over a month.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“This is Head Engineer Bong of the _EFB Andante_ to the _EXP Charlie._ We are bringing your ship into the base’s hangar. Please let us know when you’ve turned off your engine and warp generator.”

Yeonjun pushed the button for him to reply. “This is Captain Choi of the _EXP Charlie._ Will you be towing in the… the _EXP Bravo_ as well?”

“Yes. Please turn off your towing field as well.”

Yeonjun looked in Beomgyu’s direction.

“Done, Captain.” Beomgyu said. “All done.”

Yeonjun pushed the button once more. “Everything’s off, Head Engineer Bong. You may begin towing us in.”

“Thank you, Captain Choi. We’ll begin at once.”

Yeonjun found himself staggering down the narrow steps down from the ship. The gravity of the base was identical to the one they used in the microship, but he felt sapped of strength as he stepped down.

He nearly tripped on the last step, but he caught himself on the rail.

One of the base’s medical officers came to meet them with a team of nurses bringing maglev stretchers.

“I don’t need-” Yeonjun insisted as a nurse tried to help him into one of the stretchers. “I’m fi-”

He saw someone standing by the large double doors leading into the hangar.

Yeonjun frowned.

_What’s he doing here?_

Soobin was looking right at him, brow furrowed in worry.

Yeonjun climbed into the stretcher and shut his eyes. He didn’t have the energy to deal with anyone right now, least of all Kim Soobin.

“Is he okay?” Yeonjun heard Soobin ask some time later.

The nurse the initial results from the monitors he’d clipped to Yeonjun. “Seems to be, sir, but we’ll conduct more tests.”

“Thank you.” Soobin said. “And you don’t need to call me ‘sir.’”

“O- Of course, sir.”

Soobin sighed. Yeonjun thought he would leave then, but he could hear footsteps other than the gentle padding of the nurse’s shoes. _Is he going to stay with me all the way to the medical bay? Why?_

Yeonjun felt someone hold his forearm. He had a feeling it wasn’t the nurse.

“I’m sorry, Yeonjun.”

Yeonjun still kept his eyes shut, but he couldn’t help but frown. “It’s not your fault.”

“I know, but I still feel terrible,” Soobin said, giving Yeonjun’s forearm a gentle squeeze. “I- I have to go now, but I’ll come by to see you later, okay?”

Yeonjun shrugged his arm out of Soobin’s grip and turned away.

“Please let me know what room he’s in later.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You don’t have to-” Soobin sighed. “Thank you.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Chaeryeong twists a knob on the wall.

The pipes running along the rafters of the greenhouse shudder before sputtering out a fine mist over the vegetables below.

“I could do that, you know,”

Chaeryeong ignores her older sister as she screws the knob closed once more.

But the mist doesn’t stop.

“You have to…” Chaeryeong’s sister bangs a fist against the wall. The pipes shudder again before puffing out nothing but air. “It needs to be fixed, but Dad doesn’t think so, so… Chaeryeong, really, I can do that.”

Chaeryeong keeps sprinking fertilizer over the seedlings in a row by the door to the greenhouse. “I have to do _something_ or I’ll go insane.”

“Okay.” Chaeryeong’s sister leans against the doorframe. “Okay, I can get that.”

Chaeryeong finishes sprinkling fertilizer over the entire row in silence.

“Look, I know you kinda want to be alone right now,” Her sister says. “But whenever you want to talk about what happened, I’m here, okay?”

Chaeryeong blinks, watching her tears drop into the earth below. She nods.

The door to the greenhouse swings open. Their youngest sister’s standing there, her face pink and sweaty probably from running all the way from the house.

“For the last time, Chaerin, stop bothering Chaeryeong.” Their older sister grumbles. “She’s having a hard time-”

“She has a visitor.” Chaerin gasps, mopping the sweat off her forehead on the collar of her shirt.

Chaeryeong frowns.

“What kind of visitor?” Their older sister scowls. “I thought Mom got rid of all the nosy neighbors-”

“It’s a boy.” Chaerin says.

Chaeryeong stands up. “What?”

“If this is a prank, it’s _really_ not funny, Chaerin.”

“Why would I prank about something like this!” Chaerin stomps one foot in the soft earth. “I know that unnie’s boyfriend-”

“Lee Chaerin.” Their mom comes up on the garden path behind the youngest sister, putting one stern hand on top of the girl’s head. She gives Chaeryeong a sad smile. “I’m sorry, Chaeryeong, but there’s someone here to see you and he says he won’t leave until he does.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“What do you remember?”

Beomgyu tried to sit up, but the nurse must’ve given him something to sedate him, because he just ended up flopping back onto his bed, panting.

“Don’t try to move too much, Mr. Choi,” The nurse sitting by his bed said, putting a hand on his arm.

Beomgyu lay back against his pillows, but scowled at the man standing on the other side of his bed. He was wearing a Fleet uniform, but not in any of the colors Beomgyu knew of. It wasn’t even the white of a high-ranking official.

His uniform was pure black.

“Engineer Choi, I need you to make a statement on the events of the past few weeks.”

“Are we under investigation?” Beomgyu narrowed his eyes.

“The _unfortunate event_ is under investigation, not you, Engineer Choi.”

“Our captain kept meticulous logs of everything, sir.” Beomgyu replied. “If you have clearance to access them.”

The man in the black uniform laughed. “Of course, but we wanted everyone’s accounts. For comparison.”

Beomgyu sat up in his bed, glaring at the man. “Choi Yeonjun did everything he could to save the crew of the _Bravo_.”

The nurse jumped in alarm, but the man waved her off. “You all did, Engineer Choi. I’m especially interested in what you did to-”

“Read the logs.” Beomgyu muttered. “It’s there.”

“Your captain, ah, embarked the wreckage of the _EXP Bravo_ on his own when you possess the same level of licensing for spacewalks as he does.”

Ryujin frowned. “I don’t really remember, but he let the rest of us rest. He’s like that, sir, he goes and does everything on his own.”

The man nodded, taking notes on a hologram notepad projected from his watch.

“In a good way.” Ryujin added quickly. “Captain Choi’s a hero.”

“You didn’t think to take any photos or videos of the novel planet?”

“We did, but,” Taehyun licked his lips, frowning as he chose his words wisely. “They got deleted.”

“They weren’t backed up on the system?”

“No. Something on the planet interfered with our ship’s… everything.”

“I see.” The man nodded. “And the wreckage of the _EXP Bravo_. Your captain boarded the ship alone and seemed to cut the video short. Why is that?”

Taehyun shook his head. “He didn’t want us to see what filled- I mean, what was inside. He didn’t want us to see what was inside.”

“Why not?”

Taehyun frowned. He didn’t want to see it, either.

“You were the last person to speak to anyone on the _EXP Bravo_.”

Chaeryeong just stared at the screen of her window as it played a loop of fluffy white clouds flying past a bright blue sky.

“Doctor Lee?”

The nurse sitting by her bed stood up. “Sir, perhaps you should come back another time-”

“Doctor Lee, did you notice anything strange when you last spoke to the medical officer of the _EXP Bravo_?”

Chaeryeong blinked. Her eyes had begun to sting and her throat had begun to burn again.

She shook her head, feeling her tears roll over her cheeks.

“Sir, I’ll let you know when it’s a good time to debrief her,” The nurse said urgently.

“Doctor Lee,” The man said, carrying on as if the nurse weren’t there. He reached over and switched Chaeryeong’s window display off. “We need you to give a statement-”

“What’s it going to change?” Chaeryeong asks. “It won’t change anything.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Chaeryeong washes her hands in the sink outside the house, but she can’t seem to get the dirt out from under her fingernails right now.

She gives up and dries her hands on her pants as she steps in through the back door.

Her dad’s sitting in his usual chair by the bookshelf, but he’s not looking at the TV screen. He’s frowning at a person sitting on the far edge of the couch, back ruler-straight and hands folded in his lap. His white uniform gleams in the light filtering in through the window.

Chaeryeong sighs. “Dad, this is my friend from the Academy, Choi Yeonjun.”

“Chaeryeong. Hello.” Yeonjun stands up suddenly, then sits back down self-consciously. “I came to um, to pick you up for graduation.”

“I’m not going.”

Yeonjun nods slowly. “I understand.”

Chaeryeong frowns at him. “Are you?”

“Yes.”

“Really?” Chaeryeong shakes her head. “After everything they- You _still_ want to go?”

“I’m still getting the diploma, and I can still join the Fleet.” Yeonjun says. “I’m just not cleared for duty as a captain.”

Chaeryeong sighs. She turns to her dad. “Dad, could Yeonjun and I talk, um, alone?”

Chaeryeong’s dad hesitates, but he eventually stands up. “Of course.” He says, before walking up he stairs so slowly Chaeryeong almost wants to laugh.

Chaeryeong sits down next to Yeonjun, only close enough for their elbows to bump into each other. “They really won’t overturn your psych test results?”

“No.” Yeonjun says.

“So what’ll you do if you’re not a captain?” Chaeryeong asks.

“Instructor Jung said I’ll probably be assigned to an outpost as a ranger.”

Chaeryeong turns to him. She can’t believe he could say that so calmly. “And you’re okay with that?”

“I’ll work my way up from there.” Yeonjun sets his jaw. “It’ll take time, but it’s not impossible.”

Chaeryeong doesn’t doubt him. But part of her feels like she ought to stop him. _For his own good_.

“What will you do?” He asks.

“I’m not going back.”

“Yes, for the graduation, but-”

“No, Yeonjun,” Chaeryeong says. “I’m not going back, ever. I’m going to stay here. On Earth.”

Yeonjun blinks, frowning as he seems to try working it out in his head. “But all those years in the Academy- You’re going to- It’ll be a waste.”

“I can get a license to practice here.” Chaeryeong says. “The sick people here probably won’t think it’s all a waste.”

Yeonjun’s frown grows deeper.

“I went into the Academy because I wanted to see what it was like out there. Like every other kid on Earth, right?” Chaeryeong lets out a dry chuckle.

Yeonjun doesn’t laugh.

“I think I’ve seen enough.” Chaeryeong says. “You might think it’s cowardly-”

“I don’t.”

“You don’t have to lie to me, Yeonjun, it’s not worth it.” Chaeryeong sighs. “I don’t care if people think I’m being a coward or that I’m giving up and wasting potential or whatever they say. I’m going to need time to heal. You should probably consider that for yourself, too.”

“I can’t.” Yeonjun says. “Not me. I’d go crazy.”

“Of course.” Chaeryeong laughs, nudging Yeonjun with her elbow. “You? Stop working? Can’t even imagine it.”

Yeonjun cracks a small smile.

“Look, I don’t really care about the graduation,” Chaeryeong says. “But you better clap when they call my name. Like, embarrassingly loud. Like, get kicked out of the auditorium. _That_ loud.”

Yeonjun nods and gives her a salute. “Yes, ma’am.”

Chaeryeong pushes him over. “Ugh, you’re so corny. Go get out of here, you might not make it to the next shuttle.”

Yeonjun nods, straightening out his uniform as he stands up.

Chaeryeong stops and looks him over in his uniform, smiling. Yeonjun’s not the most handsome, but the uniform fits him so well it’s as if he was born to wear it. _Maybe he’s making the right decision after all._

He jumps when Chaeryeong pulls him into a hug. “Chaeryeong-”

“You take care out there, okay?” Chaeryeong says, squeezing him tightly. “I only want to hear good news about you.”

Yeonjun’s breath shudders as he pats Chaeryeong on the back. “Y- You take care of yourself, too, Chaeryeong.”

Chaeryeong lets go before she soaks his uniform in tears. She dries her eyes on the sleeves of her cardigan. “Go, I heard the traffic’s terrible outside.”

“That’s what your dad said.” Yeonjun says.

Chaeryeong laughs. “I hope he didn’t scare you.”

“Nothing scares me, Chaeryeong, you know that.”

“Right. I forgot.” Chaeryeong wipes her eyes with her cardigan sleeve again. “How could I forget?”

“I’ll be going now, Mr. Lee,” Yeonjun calls up the stairs as he heads for the door.

Chaeryeong’s dad shuffles around uncertainly from where he’s been squatting at the landing. “A- Ah, sure, yes, it was nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too, sir.”

Chaeryeong leans on the doorframe, waving as he walks towards the street.

“I’ll tell my parents to come see you if they get sick!” Yeonjun calls out. “The doctor in our dome is shit!”

Chaeryeong laughs so hard she has to sit on the front step. She waves again. “Get out of here! You’re going to be late!”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“We’ll be incorporating the memorial service for the crew of the _EXP Bravo_ into the graduation rites.”

Beomgyu frowned. “But that’s a whole _month_ from now!”

“We’ll be incorporating the memorial service for the crew of the _EXP Bravo_ into the graduation rites.”

“What the _fuck_.” Ryujin closed her eyes and lay back in her bed. She couldn’t think of anything worse.

“We’ll be incorporating the memorial service for the crew of the _EXP Bravo_ into the graduation rites.”

Taehyun only stared at the man in his strange black uniform. “You couldn’t hold a separate one now?”

“We’ll be incorporating the memorial service for the crew of the _EXP Bravo_ into the graduation rites.”

“Have you contacted their families?” Chaeryeong asked in a hoarse voice.

“Yes.”

Chaeryeong lay back against her pillows. She’d never had the chance to meet Jeongin’s family, but she couldn’t imagine what they were going through now.

“We’ll be incorporating the memorial service for the crew of the _EXP Bravo_ into the graduation rites.”

Yeonjun sat up in his bed. “But they’re not dead.”

The nurse sitting beside his bed stood up. “Captain Choi, please take it easy-”

Yeonjun took a swing at the nurse, who caught his hand easily. “You’re not really a nurse, are you?”

The nurse let go of his hand and stepped away.

“Captain Choi,” The man in the black uniform said in a flat, even tone. “I understand it’s difficult to come to terms with circumstances like these, but the sooner you do, the better it’ll be for-”

“The bridge was _empty_!” Yeonjun climbed out of bed, dodging the nurse’s hands when he tried to grab him. “We haven’t found their trackers, so you can’t just declare they’re dead-”

“Put him down.”

The nurse reached for a syringe gun on the bedside table and uncapped it. Yeonjun frowned at it. No medical professional would need a syringe gun, unless they had tremors.

_Which this man doesn’t seem to have._

Yeonjun stepped on the locks on the hospital bed and kicked it, pinning both the man in black and the nurse against the wall. He went straight for the door and slid it open.

“Y- Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun stepped around Soobin and started running down the hallway.

“Catch him!”

“Captain Choi!”

“Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun spotted the door to the medical bay’s main lobby. _Once I get out of the medical bay, they won’t be able to catch me-_

“Yeonjun!”

_GODDAMN IT._

Yeonjun skidded to a stop, trying to wrench his arm free of Kim Soobin’s grasp. “Let me go!”

“What’s happening?”

“Let me _go_ , Soobin, you don’t-”

The nurse and the other man took one of Yeonjun’s arms each, holding him down while the nurse fumbled with the syringe gun.

“What’s that?” Soobin frowned at the clear liquid in the syringe gun.

“Just a sedative.” The nurse grunted.

Yeonjun tried to kick him, but he calmly sidestepped Yeonjun’s kicks like they were nothing.

“Only give him a quarter of it.” The other man said, with a sharp sidelong glance in Soobin’s direction. Yeonjun foot connected with the man’s shin with a loud thud, but the man didn’t so much as flinch.

“Yes, sir.”

The nurse stuck the syringe into Yeonjun’s neck, pushing down on the trigger.

Yeonjun’s vision began to darken.

“Stop! You’re hurting him.” Yeonjun heard Soobin yell. “What kind of a nurse _are_ you?”

“Please leave the recovery area, Mr. Kim.” The nurse said. “People are resting.”

Soobin just glared at him. “Let go of Yeonjun.”

The nurse let go, but the man in the black uniform didn’t.

“I’m…” Soobin shut his eyes, ears reddening. “I’m going to tell my father if you don’t let him go this instant.”

The man dropped Yeonjun onto the floor.

Soobin crouched over him. “Yeonjun, are you all right?”

“The bridge was empty.” Yeonjun said between heavy gasps for breath. He felt like he was trapped underwater. “They weren’t there.”

Soobin frowned. “The crew of the _Bravo_?”

“They haven’t found their trackers.” Yeonjun panted. “They could still be out there.”

“They might not have been in the bridge.” The man in the black uniform said. “The ship was ripped apart coming out of the warp-”

“It wasn’t an accident.” Yeonjun looked up into Soobin’s eyes desperately. “It wasn’t an accident.”

His vision went completely dark as he crumpled over.

“…needs some rest. Don’t worry, Mr. Kim…”

“…recommended him for a psychological evaluation…”

The last thing Yeonjun felt was Soobin’s arms around him, keeping him from hitting the floor.


	17. Kids

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ● ◖ ◐ ○● ◖ ◐ ○ ● ◖ ◐ ○ ● ◖ ◐ ○ ● ◖ ◐ ○ ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Chaeryeong uses two fingers to gently press on the little boy’s stomach.

“Does that hurt?”

The boy shakes his head.

Chaeryeong sighs. She’d seen him wince. She pushes down just a little bit harder. “What about that?”

The boy’s eyes squint in pain, but he still shakes his head.

Chaeryeong gives up. She turns to the boy’s mother. “I think Donghyeok has appendicitis. It’s nothing serious, but just in case I have to do surgery, I’ll need to have your and your husband’s consent.”

“Does he need to be here in person?” Donghyeok’s mother asks.

“No, he can send consent via transmission. Does he work in another dome or on the Moon?”

“My dad’s a captain in the Fleet.” The boy grunts proudly.

“Oh, wonderful. Then he’ll have access to reliable comms systems.” Chaeryeong smiles at him, pulling out her phone. She turns to Donghyeok’s mother with a smile. “What’s his name?”

“Choi Yeonjun.”

Chaeryeong drops her phone on the floor. “Pardon?”

“Choi. Yeon. Jong.” Donghyeok’s mother repeats slowly.

“Oh.” Chaeryeong plucks her phone off the floor with a nervous laugh. “Choi Yeonjong. I see.”

“Is anything the matter, Doctor Lee?”

“No, nothing, I just thought,” Chaeryeong starts typing into her phone. “I had a friend at the Academy named Choi Yeonjun, he’s probably a captain in the Fleet now, too.”

“Probably?” Donghyeok asks, wincing with the effort of speaking.

“Unless he’s a Major or something.” Chaeryeong laughs. “He’s probably on his way to being the next General.”

Yeonjun slides the door to the ship’s transmission room open. He leans against the doorway, not stepping in. A girl is sitting at the station, frowning at the screen as it tracks a tiny dot nearing the rectangle that represents their ship. A man is perched on a stool next to her, his arms crossed.

“Excuse me, please identify your ship.”

“You don’t have to be polite to them.” The man says, nudging the girl out of the way as he pushes the button to speak. “Identify your ship or we will shoot.”

The girl gasps.

A voice crackles over the comms. “We’re just a simple cargo ship, hold your fire.”

“See?” The man slides back out of the way.

The girl frowns at him before pushing the button again. “What is your cargo?”

“Earthers.”

Yeonjun tenses up.

“ _This area is under Fleet protection…_ ” The man mutters.

“Oh, uh, um…This area is under Fleet protection,” The girl echoes obediently. Then she frowns as she tries to remember the rest. “Do you have clearance to uh, pass through here?”

There’s a pause before the voice over the comms replies, “Yes.”

The girl lets out a sigh of relief. “Oh, whew, okay.” She pushes the button again. “You can go on ahead.”

“No!” The man yells. “Goddamn it! What kind of a-”

“I’ll take it from here.” Yeonjun says.

The man jumps to his feet, knocking his seat over as he throws together some manner of salute. “O- Of course, Captain Choi. Get out, Seunghee.”

The girl leaps out of her seat and presses herself against the wall, barely able to get together a salute. “Y- Yes, sir.”

Yeonjun settles into the seat and starts typing. Then he hits enter and leans back, waiting for his command to take effect.

The dot of the unidentified ship comes to a halt two minutes later.

A voice comes over the comms. “W- What gives?”

“Hello, this is Ranger Captain Choi Yeonjun of Fleet Outpost FPO-4417,” Yeonjun says calmly. “Your ship has been momentarily stalled by a weak tow field, but I’ll lift it once we verify your ship’s registration and clearance.”

“Screw you!”

“Please send them over immediately.” Yeonjun continues. “So that you may carry on with your journey as soon as possible.”

“Fuck you!”

“If you’re having trouble sending your ship’s registration and clearance, I can come aboard and verify them personally.”

A small chime comes from the transmission station. Yeonjun pulls up the registration and clearance files the other ship had sent and runs them through a verification scan.

A loading bar appears on the screen.

_19 minutes left._

Yeonjun sighs. The supercomputers in this outpost are hardly deserving of the title.

“Could you wrap it up for me, Ranger Kang?” Yeonjun asks the man still saluting him at the side of the room. “I have a ferry to catch.”

“Y- Yes, Captain.” The ranger drops himself in the seat and begins typing something to look busy.

_Into the calculator. Typical._

Yeonjun smiles at the girl still pressed against the wall. “Your practicum ends today, doesn’t it, Seunghee?”

“Y- Yes, sir.”

“So you’re headed back to the Moon?”

Seunghee nods.

“Answer the captain verbally, kid.” Ranger Kang nudges the girl. “Can’t believe you didn’t even learn _that_ in a whole fucking month here.”

“Sorry.” Seunghee murmurs. “I mean, yes, sir. I’m headed back to the Moon, sir.”

“I have some business there, so let’s just go together, then,” Yeonjun says. “Don’t forget to say goodbye to the Outpost Director, then I’ll meet you at the dock?”

Seunghee nods so aggressively it seems like her head’s about to roll off. “Y- Yes, sir.”

Yeonjun settles into his seat, strapping himself in. Vague announcements crackle over the ferry’s sound system, drowned out by the voices of the hundreds of passengers seated in the ferry’s hull.

Seunghee had beat around the bush for half an hour trying to ask him to let her take the window seat. He’d agreed to it, obviously. _I’m not about to fight a kid for a window seat._

“Sorry for asking, Seunghee,” Yeonjun says, “But what year are you in again?”

“Fourth, sir.” Seunghee says. “This is my practicum.”

“Oh.” Yeonjun nods slowly. The woman in the seat behind him kicks his backrest.

“The practicum was different in your time, right, sir?”

“Yes.” Yeonjun sighs.

“Oh, I’m so sorry for bothering you, sir.”

“You’re not bothering me.” Yeonjun gets jostled in his seat as the woman behind him kicks his backrest again. “Ask me whatever you want, Seunghee, we’ve got a week to kill cooped up in here.”

Seunghee nods sheepishly, but she turns towards the window.

Yeonjun sees her touch the control panel of the ferry window, and he’s about to say something about germs when the display vanishes from the window.

Seunghee turns to him with wide eyes. “Sorry, did you want the display-”

“No.” Yeonjun looks at the dark expanse just outside window, dotted with little pinpricks of light. “I like it better that way.”

“Me too.” Seunghee grins. Yeonjun had never noticed it before, but the kid’s teeth are lined with braces.

“No, there’s nothing to worry about. A few days of rest and he’ll be running around again.” Chaeryeong says.

Donghyeok’s mother sighs. She doesn’t look too excited about it.

“Thank you so much, Doctor Lee.” Donghyeok’s father says, reaching out to assault her tired hands with another handshake. Again. _All the Fleet men are exactly the same._

Chaeryeong tries not to grimace as she shakes his hand again. “You’re welcome, Captain Choi.”

“It’s great that a Fleet doctor takes the time to take small cases like this here on Earth,” Donghyeok’s father says.

Chaeryeong blinks at him. “What? Oh no, I’m not with the Fleet.”

“But you went to the Academy, didn’t you?” Donghyeok’s mother frowns.

“Yes, I did, but I didn’t end up joining the Fleet after all.”

“That’s a shame.”

Chaeryeong stands up. “Anyway, um, don’t let me keep you guys for longer, I’m sure you’re tired from the shuttle here, Captain Choi.”

“Tell me about it! You’d have thought that the Earth shuttle would get faster in all the years I’ve been taking it, but it only seems to get slower,” Donghyeok’s father lets out a hearty laugh.

Chaeryeong manages to force out a few chuckles. “I’m glad I stopped using it years ago, then.”

“Come on, Donghyeok.” Donghyeok’s mother takes him by the shoulders and turns him to face Chaeryeong. “Thank the pretty doctor.”

Chaeryeong blushes. “Oh no-”

“Thank you, Doctor Lee.” Donghyeok says with a sharp salute.

“You’re welcome, Donghyeok.”

Chaeryeong walks the family out to the street.

“What year did you graduate, Doctor Lee?” Donghyeok’s father asks. “Maybe one of your friends is on my ship.”

“I graduated seven years ago.” Chaeryeong says.

“Seven years ago…” Donghyeok’s father hums as he thinks. “Ah, there’s a Dr. Jung on my ship.”

Chaeryeong smiles. “Jung Kai?”

“Oh, no, I don’t think that’s her name.” Donghyeok’s father frowns.

“Come on honey, Donghyeok needs to rest.”

“Ah, _boss’s orders_ ,” Donghyeok’s father laughs, giving Chaeryeong a broad wink. “It was nice to meet you, Doctor Lee.”

“You too, Captain Choi. Take care.”

Yeonjun jolts awake, feeling like he’d fallen into his seat. It’s a weird feeling he hasn’t experienced in a long time.

The woman behind him kicks his seat again. _Oh. It’s just her._

Yeonjun unclips his seatbelt.

“Please don’t get angry with her,” Seunghee whispers.

Yeonjun frowns at her in the dimmed cabin lights. He thought she’d been asleep.

“She’s kind of big.” Seunghee whispers. “I don’t think she can help it.”

Yeonjun stands up. “I was just going to stretch my legs.”

“Oh.” Seunghee nods. “I’ll watch your seat, Captain.”

“Thank you.”

Yeonjun excuses himself as he squeezes past the other eight people in their row to get to the aisle. He nearly stumbles over a crate of fruit in the middle of the floor, but he catches himself, hoping no one sees. _Good thing I’m not wearing the uniform. At least._

He only manages to do two rounds of the ferry’s cabin before someone stops him, shining a flashlight in his face.

“Excuse me, may I see your ticket?”

Yeonjun squints, shielding his eyes with one hand. “Do you work for the ferry company?”

“Of course I do-”

Yeonjun reaches out and catches someone by the wrist, twisting it as he drags them into the light.

“Ow ow ow-” The kid says, pouting up at Yeonjun. “Please don’t hurt me, sir-”

Yeonjun scoffs. _Nice try._

He plucks his credit fob out of the kid’s closed fist and presses a button.

A hologram badge comes shimmering into view.

“You have the right to remain silent-” Yeonjun drops his credit fob into his pocket so he can grab the person with the flashlight, who’d tried to run. “-and in place. Anything you can and will be used against you in a court of law.”

“Excuse me, what’s going on here?” One of the ferry’s attendants comes up to them, their bright orange vest glowing in the dimmed cabin lights.

“I’m making an arrest.” Yeonjun says. He pins the kid’s arm under one elbow to pull out his hologram badge again.

“Ah.” The ferry attendant laughs. “These two been stealing credit fobs again?”

“Yes.” Yeonjun frowns at the word _again_. Then he grabs the kid, who’s been trying to worm out of his grasp. “Where was I? Ah, you have the right to a lawyer-”

The person with the flashlight spits on the floor. “Lawyer? You think I can afford a fucking _lawyer_?”

“Well, if you cannot afford one, one will be provided to you by the State.” Yeonjun says.

“Fuck you, old man.” The kid spits.

“You have the right to remain silent.” Yeonjun repeats, before looking up at the ferry attendant. “Is there a side room or someplace else we can hold them?”

The ferry attendant makes a face. “Sorry, Ranger, but the only other _rooms_ on this ship are the cockpit and the toilets.”

“Well, no, we can’t deprive people of toilets.” Yeonjun frowns.

“Uh, Captain Choi?”

Yeonjun lifts his eyebrows. “Yes?”

Seunghee bends over to frown at the two passengers sitting next to Yeonjun, who have been cursing him for the past half hour. She notices they’re bound to their seats with clip ties. “What…”

“I caught them stealing.” Yeonjun says. “I’ll turn them over to our lunar counterparts when we land.”

“I hope this ship goes down and takes your smug ass with it!” The larger of the thieves says.

“Oh.” Seunghee leans back in her seat, trying to hide a smile. “You’re really cool, Captain Choi.”

Yeonjun grins. “Thanks, Seunghee.”

“You can eat shit, Captain Choi!”

“Thank you too,” Yeonjun tells the smaller thief.

A ferry attendant stops at the end of their row. “Breakfast.” She grunts, using a telescopic rod with rubber tongs at the end to drop greasy, lukewarm rolls in the laps of all ten passengers in the row.

“I can’t fucking eat this!” The larger thief shouts.

“How is that my problem?” The ferry attendant rolls her eyes before moving on to the next row.

“Here.” Yeonjun reaches for the thief’s roll. The smaller thief’s managed to use their knees to unwrap their roll so they can bend over and eat it, but Yeonjun doubts their older accomplice has that kind of flexibility left in them. He unwraps the thief’s roll and holds it out to them.

The thief snaps at his hand, but Yeonjun draws his hand back before he can lose a finger.

“Try that again and I’m eating this whole thing while you watch.” Yeonjun says.

The thief frowns. “Fucking bitch.”

Yeonjun smiles and holds out the roll again. “Now let’s try that again.”

The thief glares at him, baring their sharp canines.

Yeonjun lifts both eyebrows expectantly.

Then the thief takes a demure bite of the roll, staying a safe distance away from Yeonjun’s fingers.

Yeonjun helps the thief to another bite. “You can eat already, Seunghee.”

“No, I’ll wait for you, Captain.”

Yeonjun frowns when the station guards push the thieves against the wall as they cuff them. “That’s not necessary, Officer.”

“Don’t tell me what to do, Ranger.” The station guard sneers.

The other station guard laughs, dragging the handcuffed kid by the collar of his sweatshirt. “Stick to your cargo ships, Ranger.”

“Fuck you!” The older thief says, still pressed against the wall. “Captain Choi’s better than your Mooner asses!”

Yeonjun snorts to himself. “Thanks… Sorry, I didn’t catch your name?”

“Im Seunghoon.” The thief says. “That’s my kid Chaeryeong.”

The kid kicks at the station guard holding them.

“That’s…” Yeonjun blinks. “That’s a nice name.”

“It’s my mom’s name.” The kid says.

Yeonjun’s mouth goes dry. He stays frozen to the spot even as the station guard start dragging them away.

“No, you idiot, it’s the name of the doctor who saved your fucking life!” Seunghoon manages to nudge their kid with an elbow before the station guard holding him pulls him away. “Maybe she shouldn’t have! Idiot!”

Yeonjun frowns.

“Hey Captain, I didn’t know which of the bags was yours so I didn’t get it.” Seunghee says, dragging a maglev suitcase riddled with rainbow cat stickers behind her. “Sorry.”

Yeonjun shakes his head like he’s getting water out of his ear. _I haven’t gone swimming in a long time,_ he thinks vaguely.

“Uh, I didn’t bring anything.” Yeonjun says. “I just came here for today.”

Seunghee’s eyes are wide in horror. “You’re only staying today then you’re going back on a ferry for _six days_?”

Yeonjun laughs. “How are you going to survive being on a Fleet ship like that, Seunghee?”

“God, I don’t know, sir.”

Yeonjun’s only said goodbye to Seunghee for a minute before he wishes he could take it back. He sees her drag her suitcase along the Academy’s broad front steps to catch up to some other girls her age, probably also Academy students, waving at them.

“Hey guys! Where are you going for the break?”

They carry on talking like they hadn’t seen her, walking faster to leave her behind. 

Yeonjun sits on a bench in front of the Academy, watching the cars and buses on the avenue go by, glinting under the artificial sunlight of the dome above.

Yeonjun never understood why the Moon people refused to call their homes “domes” as well, when they very clearly were the same thing.

“Captain Choi!” Seunghee’s suitcase skids to a stop. “What are you still doing here? I mean, didn’t you have some event to go to?”

“Event?” Yeonjun laughs at the idea of him being invited to something, anything at all. “No, I can go there any time today. Are you taking the train home or are you waiting for someone to pick you up?”

“My uncle’s coming to pick me up.”

“I can wait until then.”

Seunghee frowns at him for a moment, then looks back at the girls, who are far down the sidewalk at this point. She looks back at Yeonjun. “They’re not my friends. But I _do_ have friends.”

“I never said otherwise.”

“No but you _looked_ \- Never mind.” Seunghee shakes her head and takes the vacant seat on the bench. “You’re right, I don’t have any friends.”

Yeonjun crosses one leg over the other. “I didn’t either when I was in the Academy.”

_No, I had_ one _,_ Yeonjun thinks sadly.

“It’s different for you,” Seunghee crosses her arms. “You were ranked first in your major. I’m 196th. Out of 200.”

“Who told you that?”

“That I’m 196th? The Rank Drop.” Seunghee sighs. “Hate it.”

“I hate it too,” Yeonjun says. “No, I was asking who told you I was ranked first?”

“Oh.” Seunghee blushes. “The Outpost Director.”

Yeonjun makes a mental note to ask the Outpost Director to stop hard-selling him to everyone he meets like day-old bread. “I graduated third in my major. Not first.”

Seunghee scrapes her sneakers on the pavement, squeezing her suitcase between her knees. “So how did you get assigned to an outpost?” She mutters.

She catches Yeonjun looking at her. Seunghee gasps and covers her mouth. “Oh god. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Captain, I didn’t mean to- Please don’t be angry, I didn’t mean-”

“It’s okay.”

“There’s nothing wrong with being assigned to an outpost!” Seunghee says, standing up suddenly and waving her hands aggressively. “It’s good work and someone has to do it!”

Yeonjun barely stifles a smile. “Did you also get that from the Outpost Director?”

Seunghee sinks into her seat, her face turning a deep shade of pink. “Yes.”

“Of all the things the Outpost Director said about me,” Yeonjun says slowly. “Did she ever tell you why I was assigned to that outpost?”

Seunghee shakes her head. “I mean, no sir, she didn’t.”

“I have a pretty bad case of PTSD.”

Yeonjun hasn’t said that out loud to anyone in years. _Actually, I’ve probably never said this to anyone. Why am I saying it to some kid I’ve only known a month?_

Seunghee wrings her hands in her lap. _I’m so sorry I dropped all that on you,_ Yeonjun thinks.

“Sorry.” Yeonjun says.

“It’s okay.” Seunghee murmurs. “Thank you for sharing it with me.”

Yeonjun smiles despite himself. _She’s a good kid._

“I’m lucky it’s not the more violent cases, at least,” Yeonjun says. “It just affects my memories.”

“But you have a great memory, Captain.”

“I have a very vivid memory, yeah,” Yeonjun says. “But I remember things wrong sometimes. It’s like my brain makes things up that never happened but I think they did and-” He notices how troubled Seunghee’s expression has gotten. “It’s not that bad, but it’s not something you’d want in the captain of an exploratory vessel.”

Seunghee just nods, still looking down at her hands. She’s started chipping away at her purple nail polish, which is nearly completely gone after her three-week practicum at the outpost.

She doesn’t notice a bright yellow maglev sports car come to a stop in front of them, but Yeonjun does.

The car lowers itself to the road as it powers down.

Yeonjun’s not been back to the Moon in five years, but everything about this car screams brand new to him. Yeonjun hates every inch of it already.

The driver’s side door opens and slams shut. The driver comes out in a shiny silver jacket, tight black jeans, and huge sunglasses despite the fact that the dome’s strip lights overhead were already beginning to dim for the evening. Yeonjun hates this guy already.

“Park Seunghee, you little brat, why didn’t you tell me your ferry arrived early?”

Yeonjun sits up, frowning. He knows that voice.

Then Seunghee’s uncle whips his glasses off. Yeonjun hadn’t recognized him at first, since he’s taller and not as skinny as Yeonjun remembers, but he’s got that same general disdain in his big, round eyes.

His eyes and mouth drop open in three perfect circles when he sees Yeonjun. “Choi Yeonjun? _Choi Yeonjun?_ Is that you? You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

Yeonjun can’t help but smile. “Hi, Beomgyu.”

Seunghee stares at him with her eyes saucer-wide. “You know my uncle, Captain?”

“That’s an understatement.” Beomgyu says. He walks up to Yeonjun but stops a few steps away, narrowing his eyes warily. “How do you know my niece?”

“She did her practicum at the outpost I’m assigned to.” Yeonjun says, watching Beomgyu’s expression slide from shock to disappointment. _Of course. He didn’t know._

“Captain Choi’s the coolest.” Seunghee says.

Beomgyu lets out a noncommittal grunt. “Go put your suitcase in the back, brat. We have to stop by the Memorial on the way home.”

Seunghee frowns at that, but rolls her suitcase to the sports car anyway. Beomgyu clicks a button on his watch, and the trunk pops open.

He turns back to Yeonjun. “You’re headed to the Memorial too, aren’t you?”

Yeonjun nods.

“Seunghee! Sit in the back!” Beomgyu yells at his niece. “Come on, Captain.”

“What?”

“I mean Yeonjun.” Beomgyu shakes his head. “Stop looking at me like that. I meant to say Yeonjun, it’s just that my niece- Stop looking at me like that!”

“I’m not doing anything.” Yeonjun laughs.

Beomgyu turns Yeonjun’s face away with one finger. “Stop it, if you piss me off too much, you’re _walking_ to the Memorial-”

“I was planning to do that anyway.”

“From _here_?” Beomgyu squints down to the end of the long avenue. “Absolutely not. Not on my watch. Get in.” He holds the passenger side door open for Yeonjun.

Yeonjun grins as he steps in. “Thank you, Beomgyu.”

“Anytime, Captain.” Beomgyu says, slamming the door. He shuts his eyes. “Dammit.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's been a 7-year timeskip, in case that wasn't clear 
> 
> also imagine beomgyu's car is a levitating lambo... big yikes


	18. Empty

Yeonjun stops, frowning at the words engraved into the fogged glass wall opposite him.

**_State Fleet Memorial_**

_→ East Wing_

_↑ North Wing_

_↓_ _South Wing_

_← West Wing_

_→ Pearl Wing_

“What’s wrong, Captain?”

Yeonjun shakes his head, trying to give Seunghee something close to a comforting smile. “Nothing, I just didn’t know there was a new wing.”

Seunghee only frowns at him.

“It’s been there for a few years now.” Beomgyu mutters, folding his jacket under one arm. “We’ve needed a lot more space recently.”

“Oh.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

The casket was beginning to leave an imprint on Yeonjun’s shoulder through the thick material of his gray dress uniform, but even then, it was too light.

_Because it’s empty._

Yeonjun didn’t see the point in carrying this casket, with the State flag neatly pinned to the top, all the way from the Academy to the Memorial.

_It’s empty._

That didn’t stop the other five people carrying the casket from crying as they walked, their heaving shoulders shaking the entire casket. Yeonjun’s eyes were dry from the conditioned Moon dome air, and nothing else.

The Academy band greeted the caskets with a solemn rendition of the State’s anthem. Yeonjun could only stare at the five caskets lined up in front of the Memorial's cold glass façade.

_They’re all empty._

Still, he took one of the white roses offered to him and lay it under the empty crypt.

_Bang Chan_

_2197 - 2217_

_Captain_

“I heard about what you did for him.”

Yeonjun stopped peeling a wet leaf from the rose off his hand. Chan’s mom was standing next to him, staring at the engraving on the crypt with a dull, blank expression.

“Thank you.” Chan’s mom said. Her voice was hoarse, probably from crying, but she was crying just about as much as Yeonjun was right now. She bent into a deep bow. “Thank you, Choi Yeonjun.”

“No, you don’t need to…” Yeonjun’s hands shot out, trying to stop her from bowing again. Some people were beginning to look their way. “Please don’t. I wasn’t able to save him.”

Chan’s mom took both of Yeonjun’s hands in hers. “You did all you could.”

Yeonjun tried to take a breath, but the stale air of the Memorial’s East Wing got caught in his throat.

“You’ll help many people, Yeonjun.”

Yeonjun had nothing to say. He shook his head.

The other people began to stir. Someone had arrived to give some words to the grieving families. It was the General. The General had arrived at the Memorial.

Chan’s mom gripped Yeonjun’s hands tighter. “I have to go, sorry.”

“I understand.”

“I’ll see you here next year?”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun blinks.

He finds himself sitting on one of the steel benches across the hallway from Chan’s crypt. _When did I get here?_

_Oh no._

“Yeonjun, how are you feeling?” Beomgyu asks, one hand on Yeonjun’s arm, touching him so lightly that Yeonjun feels Beomgyu’s ready to let go at any second. Yeonjun frowns. _Did I scare him? I hope not._

“I’m all right now.”

Beomgyu frowns, looking into Yeonjun’s eyes for so long that Yeonjun feels his ears going warm. _I’ve probably gotten so used to seeing just the eight other people at the outpost that Choi Beomgyu is suddenly something different._

“Seunghee.” Beomgyu says.

Seunghee had been walking down the length of the entire East Wing, reading the names on every crypt. She stops and stares at her uncle, eyes wide as if to ask, _Me? Are you talking to me?_

“Go buy some flowers from outside.” Beomgyu says, reaching into his pockets. “And get yourself and ice cream or something while you’re at it.”

“I’m not a kid, Uncle, I’m not bored-” Seunghee stops when Beomgyu tosses her something. She catches it and looks down at the credit fob in her palm with a sense of fondness most people reserve for their pets. “Oh, thanks, Uncle!”

Beomgyu grunts in reply, nodding as Seunghee skips off towards the exit.

“She’s a good kid.” Yeonjun says. “You could be nicer to her.”

“She’s a nineteen-year-old adult and has the thickest skin I’ve ever seen. She’s practically a reptile.” Beomgyu says. “Don’t worry about her.”

Yeonjun chuckles, leaning back against the slightly greenish, smoky glass wall of the hallway. It’s cool against his back, which is slick with sweat. He wipes his damp hair away from his forehead. “Imagine I’m calling a nineteen-year-old a _kid_ now.”

“I was her age when we…” Beomgyu sighs. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay, we can’t avoid talking about it now, can we?” Yeonjun looks across the hallway at Chan’s crypt.

“I know, I just- I know you have- Yeonjun,” Beomgyu squeezes Yeonjun’s arm. “You’re getting help for it, right?”

“I did.”

Beomgyu frowns, resting his head suddenly against Yeonjun’s shoulder, hugging Yeonjun’s arm like a pillow.

Yeonjun’s face had been warm already, but it’s hot now.

“It’s your first time back here, isn’t it?” Beomgyu asks quietly.

Yeonjun can only nod.

Beomgyu looks up at Yeonjun, his head still propped on Yeonjun’s shoulder. “I’m sorry you had to get the worst of it.”

Yeonjun turns his face away. “It’s not your fault.”

“I know, but it just doesn’t feel fair,” Beomgyu says. “That I’m fine. And you’re not.”

“I’m fine.” Yeonjun says, sounding more defensive than he had hoped he would.

Beomgyu gets off Yeonjun’s shoulder to lean against the wall behind them. He doesn’t stop looking at Yeonjun, though. “You’re a Ranger.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that.” Yeonjun finds the words marching right out of his mouth before he can stop them. “It’s good work and someone has to do it.”

“That’s true.” Beomgyu nods. “But you’re not that someone. You’re… You know what Ryujin and I used to call you?”

Yeonjun hasn’t even thought about Ryujin in a long time. He wonders briefly where she might be now. “What?”

“Perfect Human Being Choi Yeonjun.”

Yeonjun ducks his head down, feeling his ears burning like the edge of a laser knife. “You guys were always such-”

“You’re everything that anyone could ask for in one person, the rest of us look like shit next to you, even though I know for a fact that I’m not.” Beomgyu crosses his arms restlessly. “Actually, if you’d ask me, you’re too good for the whole fucking Fleet-”

“Beomgyu.”

“-And I can’t believe they’re just wasting you on some far-flung _middle of no-fucking-where_ outpost!”

Yeonjun’s hands furl into fists. “Beomgyu, I’m perfectly capable of living my own life-”

“I’m not fucking done. Did you think I was done?” Beomgyu stands up. “Have you applied for a promotion this Reshuffling?”

Yeonjun digs his nails into his palms. Beomgyu’s right. He shouldn’t get angry with him. _Because he’s right._

_That only makes it worse._

“Of course I have.”

“Good.” Beomgyu picks up his jacket, which he’d dropped on the floor in his agitation. He tucks some hair self-consciously behind his ear. “I mean sorry. It’s not my place to-”

“It’s okay, Beomgyu.” Yeonjun gives him a wan smile. “Glad to see you haven’t changed.”

“I _have_.” Beomgyu snaps. Then he blushes and covers his face with one hand. “I have, okay. Believe me.”

Yeonjun opens his mouth to tease Beomgyu, but Seunghee comes shuffling into the hallway just then, dragging her sneakers on the polished stone floor.

“The ice cream person wasn’t there,” Seunghee wags a brown paper bundle. “But I got the flowers.”

Beomgyu sticks his hand out. “Give it here.”

Seunghee hands him the flowers, which he passes on to Yeonjun without looking away from his niece.

“ _Ohhh_ ,” She laughs and fishes Beomgyu’s credit fob out of her windbreaker’s pocket, placing it gently into his hand like she’s afraid of shattering it. “Thanks, Uncle.”

Yeonjun peels back the paper wrapping.

He nearly drops the entire bundle. “Where did you get this?”

“It’s all the shop had left,” Seunghee admits, wrinkling her nose. “It was kinda expensive, but I don’t know if-”

“ _How_ expensive?” Beomgyu taps his credit fob against his holo-watch to check his credit balance. “Holy fuck, what kind of flowers _are_ those?”

Yeonjun takes the flowers gently out of the package. Their white petals form a broad star-shape, with a bright yellow bulb in the center. His heart aches just looking at them.

“Seunghee, did you tell them it was for a crypt?”

“I did, but they had nothing else cause it’s late and someone made an order for those but they didn’t pick it up-”

“God, Seunghee, I’ve never even seen that kind of flower-”

“They’re potato blossoms.” Yeonjun says. He tries to swallow, but there’s a huge lump in his throat.

“ _Potato_ blossoms?” Beomgyu makes a face. “Potatoes are a fucking _food_! Seunghee, what the hell have you-”

“Captain,” Seunghee tilts her head, frowning at Yeonjun. “Are you…”

Beomgyu turns to Yeonjun.

Two tears tumble town Yeonjun’s cheeks, hitting the brown paper parcel in his hands with gentle taps.

“No, Yeonjun,” Beomgyu takes the flowers from him and holds them out to Seunghee. “Go put these on Bang Chan’s shelf. Make it nice.”

“Yes, Uncle.”

Beomgyu’s arms are around Yeonjun before he can stop them.

Yeonjun tries shaking his head, but Beomgyu doesn’t let go.

He only tightens his arms around Yeonjun.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun gasped for air, clambering off the ground. He felt like someone was standing on his chest.

“Did you get wounded anywhere? What’s happening?” Beomgyu unzipped Yeonjun’s exosuit, patting him down to feel for blood or anything sharp. “Come on, let Chaeryeong have a look at you.”

Yeonjun shook his head, mouth ajar as he tried to draw in any kind of air, but it felt like there was none in the tiny anteroom.

Beomgyu tried to pull him to his feet again, but he could only lift Yeonjun halfway there. “Yeonjun, please, I need you to help me-”

Yeonjun let his head falls against Beomgyu’s shoulder, burying his face in the crook of Beomgyu’s neck.

Beomgyu froze, startled for a second. But the second soon passed, and he wrapped his arms around Yeonjun.

Yeonjun began to sob silently into the collar of Beomgyu’s shirt.

“No, Yeonjun,” Beomgyu tightened his arms around Yeonjun, though his knees were starting to shake. “You shouldn’t have-”

“Empty.”

“What?” Beomgyu frowned as he held Yeonjun close to him, feeling Yeonjun’s frantic heartbeat against his own.

“They’re not there.” Yeonjun’s voice seemed so far away, even to himself. “They’re not there. They’re not-”

“Yeonjun, what do you mean?”

“They’re not there.” Yeonjun shook his head into Beomgyu’s shoulder.

Beomgyu’s knees finally gave way, dropping them both back onto the floor of the _Charlie’s_ anteroom. “What do you mean?”

Yeonjun only pressed himself closer to Beomgyu, crying silently.

Beomgyu dug his fingertips into Yeonjun’s back, holding him with no intentions of letting go. “What do you mean they’re not there?”

“It’s empty.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun opens his eyes slowly, surprised by the sudden darkness. He shuts his eyes for a moment to let his eyes adjust. He’s lying in the backseat of Beomgyu’s car, held in place by a tangle of seatbelts. Bright lights fly past the window he can see out of, the warm, friendly lights of Sector 2. _That much hasn’t changed since I was in the Academy._

Yeonjun tries to sit up, but the seatbelts don’t have much give, keeping him from even doing that much.

“Beomgyu.”

He feels the car skid to the side of the road, sending Yeonjun’s head into the door.

Seunghee whirls around from the passenger seat. “Oh my gosh, are you okay, Captain?”

Beomgyu looks at him, too but he doesn’t say anything.

“Can you…” Yeonjun frowns at the tangle of seatbelts around him. _What did I do? I must have scared them a lot._ “Untie me?”

Beomgyu throws his door open and slams it.

In a second he’s leaning over the backseat, carefully undoing some knots he’d made in the seatbelts. Yeonjun had the feeling there was some method to the madness. _It’s Beomgyu, after all._

He looks up at Beomgyu, who chews on his lip as he tries to remember how he tied the part near Yeonjun’s head. “I’m sorry, Beomgyu.”

“What for?” Beomgyu makes a face, his eyebrows raising briefly when he remembers what he’d done.

“I didn’t hurt you? Or Seunghee?”

“What? Of course not. You just passed the fuck out.” Beomgyu looks down at Yeonjun then, lit by the harsh white streetlight next to the car. “Why would you ask that?”

Yeonjun shakes his head.

“I thought you said your PTSD isn’t the violent kind?” Seunghee asks, peeking over the passenger side backrest.

“It’s not usually, but I don’t take any chances.”

“Today was a lot.” Beomgyu undoes the last seatbelt, holding it so it snaps back to position gently. “Maybe you weren’t as ready for it as you thought you were.”

“Maybe.” Yeonjun flicks his hair out of his face. He’s gotten _very_ sweaty, despite the temperature outside being the usual single-digits of a Moon night. “I should probably go catch the last ferry-”

“Absolutely not.” Beomgyu holds a hand out to Yeonjun. “We’re getting something to eat. My treat.”

Yeonjun takes the hand, surprised when Beomgyu pulls him up with more force than Yeonjun had expected. _Who_ _do you think carried you to the car? Seunghee?_

“I can pay for myself-”

“I never said you couldn’t.” Beomgyu rolls his eyes. He taps the hood of his car. “Seunghee, go ask them for a table for 3.”

“Yes, sir!” Seunghee beams, saluting her uncle before running off to the restaurant at the side of the road.

Yeonjun inhales the Moon air deeply. It’s odorless by design, and Yeonjun had forgotten how much he’d hated it. _At least the cycling air in the outpost has a kind of wet, fishy smell. It has_ something _._

He notices Beomgyu watching him intently, like Beomgyu’s trying to pick him apart with just his eyes. “I don’t need your pity, Beomgyu.”

“This is me trying to offer my _friendship_ , you idiot. Tell the difference.” Beomgyu throws an arm carelessly around Yeonjun’s shoulders. “Come on, Seunghee’s probably going to wait for us before even looking at the menu.”

“I told you she’s a good kid.”

“I never said she wasn’t.”

Seunghee goes into a deep bow, nearly dipping her bangs into her bowl of soup. “Thank you so much, Captain, I’ll never forget this-”

“Just take the fucking noodles.” Beomgyu scowls, tipping the remainder of Yeonjun’s noodles into Seunghee’s bowl. “Don’t be dramatic.”

Yeonjun smiles at him. “You’re one to talk.”

Beomgyu rolls his eyes, picking up a dumpling to stuff it into Yeonjun’s mouth. “You don’t have the right to say anything, do you know how _heavy_ you are? Next time you pass out make sure there’s a bed under you-”

“Shorry.” Yeonjun grins, pushing the dumpling to one side of his mouth to chew it.

Beomgyu opens his mouth to say something else, but Seunghee slurps on her noodles so hard that soup flicks right into Beomgyu’s face.

He blinks, nose scrunching in pure disgust.

“Oh, Seunghee, be careful,” Yeonjun laughs, reaching for some tissue on the next table for Beomgyu.

Seunghee bows, dipping the tip of her fringe into her soup. “Sorry.”

Yeonjun laughs again.

“Good god, Park Seunghee, what if someone sees you?” Beomgyu frowns, peeling a sheet of tissue to dry his niece’s dripping bangs. “For all we know the Academy Director might be sitting just over there.”

Seunghee scowls at the unkempt man in the corner her uncle had pointed at. He’s as far from Director Min as is humanely possible. “What’s he going to do? I’m already 196th.”

“And you’re _proud_ of it?” Beomgyu frowns. “You can always go lower!”

“But exams are already _done_ -!”

“You never know!”

“There’s nothing wrong with coming in 196th.” Yeonjun says, taking a sip of water. “The ranks don’t matter as long as you finish.”

Beomgyu purses his lips respectfully.

Seunghee gives Yeonjun a wide smile, knowing full well that a sliver of spring onion’s caught between her front teeth. “Thanks, Captain.”

“But if you want to get rich like your uncle, I’d try to get out of the outposts as quickly as possible if I were you,” Yeonjun says.

Seunghee frowns. “He’s only rich because his boyfriend’s rich.”

Beomgyu grimaces. “You little shit, I am a Senior Researcher at the Fleet’s premier base-”

Seunghee winks at Yeonjun, emboldened by two and a half bowls of ramen. “Ask the Senior Researcher where his car’s from.”

Yeonjun turns to Beomgyu with both eyebrows raised in amusement.

Beomgyu’s face gets as red as the chili oil on the table.

Yeonjun doesn’t really want to pry into Beomgyu’s love life, but he’s having fun. “Well?”

Beomgyu mutters something under his breath.

“What was that, Uncle?”

“It was a gift!” Beomgyu crosses his arms and looks away from Yeonjun. “Laugh all you want but _I’m_ still the one with a brand new-”

“I was actually kind of relieved you didn’t pick it out for yourself.” Yeonjun says. “It’s a pretty ugly model.”

“Tell me about it.” Beomgyu groans. “I just have to use it every now and then so I don’t hurt his feelings. He has no taste whatsoever. For such a rich guy, he’s so tacky.”

Seunghee lets out a cross between a giggle and a gasp. “Uncle, don’t say that about the _General’s_ son!”

Yeonjun chortles on the water he’d been drinking. Without lowering his glass, he turns to Beomgyu with a questioning look.

Beomgyu looks at every last thing on the table and floor just to avoid Yeonjun’s gaze. He clears his throat self-consciously.

Yeonjun takes some more tissue from the next table (it’s empty, of course) to dry the water that had dribbled down his chin. “The General doesn’t have any other sons, does he?”

“No, he doesn’t.” Beomgyu says, still gazing pointedly at his empty bowl like he’s trying to win a staring contest against it.

“Oh.” Yeonjun nods distractedly. “Okay. I see.”


	19. Bottom of the Heap

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Chaeryeong feels weirdly light. She glances down at her hands.

_Interesting._

She stands up. She’s not been this skinny in _years_. It’s a weird feeling, but a fun sort of weird.

Chaeryeong starts skipping around. She even does a cartwheel. _When was the last time I landed a fucking cartwheel?_

Chaeryeong tries another one, then wobbles off balance, landing on a bed of soft grass, laughing.

“What’s so funny, Ryeongchae?”

Chaeryeong feels the heat from the dome’s light strips overhead shielded by a figure leaning over her, but she doesn’t dare open her eyes.

“Hey,” She gets tickled in the stomach, but however much she wants to laugh, she can’t. “Hey, what’s up?”

Chaeryeong opens her eyes gently, taking deep breaths as she braces herself for what she thinks she’ll see.

Jeongin smiles down at her, kneeling on the grass next to her. He tries to tickle her again, but she catches his hand.

“Stop.” Chaeryeong frowns, her eyes filling with hot tears. “How could you do this to me?”

“What?” Jeongin’s forehead wrinkles the way it does when he’s studying. “You could just tell me to stop-”

“You _did_ stop!” Chaeryeong covers her face. “You stopped for years! Why this dream again!”

“What dream?”

“Why _now?_ ” Chaeryeong hiccups, trying to breathe through her tears and runny nose.

“Ryeongchae,” Jeongin tries to take her in his arms, but she pushes him away.

Chaeryeong staggers to her feet. “You’re not real. You’re d- You- You died seven years ago.”

Jeongin doesn’t say anything. He just stands up and frowns at her.

“It’s taken me this long to get over you,” Chaeryeong holds out her hands to keep him from coming closer, whatever he is. “It’s taken me this long- And I still think about you but not- I can’t deal with _this_!”

The Jeongin in her dream looks just as he had when she last saw him, with his messy dark hair, bright green t-shirt, and clear plastic retainers. Chaeryeong drops to her knees. Her chest hurts so much it feels it’s about to explode, and part of her wishes it just would.

“Please leave me alone,” Chaeryeong begs, face buried in her hands. “I can’t do this- I can’t- Please!”

“Ryeongchae, I-”

“Please don’t talk to me. You’re not him. Please, it’s hard enough-”

“A new blight is spreading.”

Chaeryeong frowns, rubbing the tears from her eyes as she looks up.

“Many have nothing to eat.”

_That’s not Jeongin’s voice._

Chaeryeong sees the darkness creeping down from above, as the image of Jeongin continues to say things in a voice that she vaguely recognizes. _But it’s not his._

“What should I do?”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Chaeryeong jolts awake, like she’d fallen into her chair. She gets her bearings, sitting up in the creaky wicker chair she’d fallen asleep in. She’s not at home. No, she’s at a patient’s house. She’d gone to visit the patient, because the patient had difficulty walking after a recent stroke.

Chaeryeong takes a breath. She can still see the shadows and outlines of her dream.

_Jeongin._

She would be lying if she said she didn’t think of him often.

“Oh, Doctor Beautiful,” The elderly woman sitting up in the bed next to her gives her a smile. “I told Seungmin to let you sleep, since you looked so tired.”

“Oh dear, did I?” Chaeryeong laughs as she rubs her eyes, checking her reflection in a dresser in the corner of the room. “I forgot to put makeup on before I stepped out this morning, Madam Kim.”

“Oh, you know it’s not _that_. Women like us don’t need makeup.” The elderly woman waves a hand dismissively. Her hand trembles under the weight of the eight rings on her fingers, but Chaeryeong knows the old landowner well enough to know that she wouldn’t be caught dead without them.

“I’m sorry for sleeping here just like this, just the same,” Chaeryeong says with a quick, embarrassed bow. “I’ll be taking my leave now, Madam Kim.”

“Are you sure you wouldn’t like something to eat? I’m sure the staff have prepared afternoon tea.”

“No, thank you.” Chaeryeong says. “I’m afraid I have ah, another appointment after this.”

“Oh dear, I hope I haven’t kept them waiting too long.”

Chaerin throws the door to their room open. “See, Mom, I _told_ you she was-”

“Yes, thank you, Chaerin.” Their mom ushers her youngest daughter back out of the room before closing the door. She turns to Chaeryeong, who’s holding up two heavy traveling coats. “Where are you going?”

“The Moon.”

Her mother frowns. “Why?”

“I…” Chaeryeong shakes her head, folding the thicker of the two coats under her arm. “I’m going to meet some friends from the Academy.”

“Really? Why now, all of a sudden-”

“Chaeyeon’s already promised to take care of our patients,” Chaeryeong says. She picks up a lumpy handbag and, on her way out the door, kisses her mom of the cheek. “I’ll be back in maybe two weeks. They say you can’t tell with the shuttle these days.”

“Chaeryeong,” Her mom’s mouth twitches. “Take care, I hear there are many radicals out there these days.”

“Not in our solar system, Mom, the Earth-Moon shuttle seems safe enough,” Chaeryeong pulls her mom into a tight hug. “But I’ll be careful, I promise.”

Chaeryeong’s mom pats her on the back.

She leans against the doorway, listening to Chaeryeong say goodbye to her father before stepping out the front door.

“Mom.” Chaerin comes stomping up the stairs. “You did _not_ let her go.”

“She’s a grown woman, Chaerin. I’m not in the business of grounding adults.”

Chaerin lets out a loud groan. “But it’s… It’s Yang Jeongin’s death anniversary.”

“I know.”

“You wanted to see me, ma’am?”

“Please,” The director of Fleet Outpost 4417 makes a grand gesture to the hole-ridden seat across her faded desk. “Have a seat, Yeonjun. How was your holiday?”

“Oh.” Yeonjun licks his lips, having trouble choosing his words all of a sudden. “Not as bad as I thought it would be, Director.”

“You’ve submitted your application for promotion?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Yeonjun nods. “Thank you for the recommendation.”

“Of course.” The outpost director tries to rearrange the things on her desk, ending up putting them back where they were to begin with. “You should take a longer vacation.”

“No, thank you, ma’am-”

“I approve all your leaves, Captain Choi. I know you haven’t been home since you got here.”

Yeonjun folds his hands in his lap. “Our outpost is understaffed-”

“Hardly. There’s such little traffic through here that in the time you’ve been gone, Ranger Soon has learned to play the flute with his nose.”

Yeonjun blinks. “That’s… impressive.”

“It’s disgusting, that’s what it is.” The outpost director sighs. “I used to work on a ship, you know.”

“The _EXP Largo_.” Yeonjun says with a dutifully respectful nod.

“I started out as a secondary pilot, but I was promoted to primary pilot in…ah…”

“2184.” Yeonjun offers helpfully.

“Yes, in 2184 I was promoted to primary pilot of the _Largo_. One of the first megaships in the Fleet, just beautiful.” The outpost director settles into a dreamy smile. “I was primary pilot until 2197.”

The outpost director smiles.

“The year I was born.” Yeonjun says, just as the outpost director says,

“The year you were born!” The outpost director laughs. “Imagine that. The _Largo_ went down on the year you were born.”

Yeonjun finds himself wringing his hands. He hates it whenever she gets to this part.

“It was the radicals. We didn’t call them that then. They were just Earthers.” The outpost director notices the twitch in Yeonjun’s eye just a little too late, as always. “They were nothing like you, of course. They weren’t honest workers. They thought they could kill and loot and scare us into giving them everything they wanted… But someone had to take the fall for the _Largo_ ’s crash. They couldn’t demote those… those monsters. So it was me.”

Yeonjun sees the director’s gaze sharpen again. “You applied for captaincy of a Fleet megaship?”

“ _Mega_ ship?” Yeonjun frowns. “I applied for a dekaship. Even then it seems like a stretch-”

“Nonsense.” The outpost director shakes her head. “Aim ridiculously high, so you end up higher than you should be.”

Yeonjun has no choice but to laugh. He’s so going to tell the other rangers about that later. Ranger Soon is probably going to offer to tattoo it on Yeonjun’s chest.

“Besides, there are so many megaships these days.” The outpost director huffs. “What’s the biggest ship they have now, a gigaship?”

“They have one teraship now,” Yeonjun says. “The _EFB Descant_.”

“How big is a teraship?”

“Around the size of the Earth’s natural satellite.”

The outpost director looks deeply troubled upon hearing that.

Beomgyu hears a commotion outside of his office. _Okay, there’s always some commotion or the other in the lab._ The _Descant_ is too big and full of people to stay quiet for more than a second.

Some things clatter to the floor, and the voices of the junior researchers get more and more pinched as they squeak out overly respectful greetings.

 _Ah._ That _kind of commotion._

Beomgyu calmly presses _Ok_ on the printer at the side of his desk. The printer whirrs to life, building a circuit on a sheet of metal the size of his thumbnail.

He looks out the fogged glass wall of his office. He can vaguely see the outlines of the junior researchers shuffling around nervously, bending over in rushed bows.

“Three… two… one…” Beomgyu mutters under his breath.

The door to his office slides open with a bang. The man who’d thrown it open knew full well that glass has a tendency to shatter when thrown around, and gave zero fucks on the matter.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were back already, my love?”

Beomgyu doesn’t take his eyes off the printer, squinting at the needle-thin connections being printed on the tiny, tiny chip. But he does see the throng of junior researchers in their overly white lab coats gathering just outside his office like ants around a crumb. They were probably committing things to memory so they could relay the information to their respective seniors. _Poor things,_ Beomgyu thinks without an ounce of pity.

“What did I say about calling me that in _public_?” He uses his nose to point at the junior researchers, who quickly pretend to be busy with other things.

Soobin smiles, his eyes forming little crescents. “That’s it’s damn cute?”

Beomgyu folds his arms. Then he smiles. “Yeah, damn right.”

He tilts his cheek out to accept a kiss from Soobin before slamming his door shut in the junior researchers’ nosy faces.

“How’d you get here?” Soobin asks, brushing aside some of the things of top of Beomgyu’s low shelf to sit on it.

“I hitched a ride with the _Arpeggio,_ ” Beomgyu says, walking to his printer just as it chimed to let him know the chip was finished. “We owe Captain Dong dinner.”

“Why is it that when you rack up debt,” Soobin asks, hopping off the shelf. “It becomes a _‘we’_ , but when I do-”

“When does that ever happen?” Beomgyu asks.

“Good point.” Soobin rests his chin on one of Beomgyu’s shoulders to watch Beomgyu pluck the newly printed chip off the printing bed with a pair of tweezers. “What’s that?”

“Top secret.” Beomgyu says.

Soobin grins, pinching Beomgyu lightly on the side.

Beomgyu stiffens up, tilting his head to glare at Soobin. “Goddamn it, I nearly dropped it.”

“But you didn’t.” Soobin laughs, knocking the stack of things on Beomgyu’s chair so he can sit in it. “What is it?”

“Could you stop making a mess of my office?” Beomgyu grumbles, gluing the chip onto a clear film. “You’re worse than the interns.”

Soobin scoffs. “The interns wouldn’t dare come in here, my love.”

Beomgyu smirks as he reaches for a can on a shelf above his workbench. He sprays the chip with an even layer of the blue substance inside the can. The blue substance fades until it’s clear, taking the silver color of the chip along with it.

“Ooh, cool.” Soobin says, not bothering to get out of Beomgyu’s chair, dragging it over the mess all over the floor. “What is-”

“Open your mouth.” Beomgyu says.

Soobin frowns, but his mouth drops open obediently. “Wha-”

“Nothing, I just wanted you to look stupid.” Beomgyu wags the clear strip, blowing on it. He folds the strip away in a piece of paper that he scribbles something on. He turns back to find Soobin spinning around in his zero-friction, ergonomically-designed maglev office chair. He can’t help but smile.

“How’s your family doing?” Soobin asks, still spinning.

“Fine. Mom thinks I’m going to be eaten by radicals or something, and my dumb sister keeps egging her on,” Beomgyu smiles when he hears Soobin snort. “Seunghee just finished her practicum.”

“She was at that outpost in the Scorpius cluster, right?”

Beomgyu sticks one foot out to stop Soobin from spinning. “How come everyone seems to know that except me?”

“She’s _your_ niece,” Soobin says. “Try being more interested in her. She’s a good kid.”

He sees Yeonjun’s little frown in his mind. _She’s a good kid._

Beomgyu frowns. He’s paused in place, holding the tiny paper parcel in his hand over two of his drawers as he decides which one to file it under.

“Beomgyu?”

“Huh?” Beomgyu shakes his head. _Prototypes VI,_ of course this goes under _Prototypes VI_. “Sorry.”

“What’re you thinking about, my love?”

Beomgyu closes the drawer, locking it with his thumbprint. “You’ll never believe who I ran into at the Memorial.”

“Oh, I’m sorry I couldn’t go.” Soobin says, inching towards Beomgyu in the office chair. “Who’d you meet?”

“Yeonjun.”

Soobin forgets to stop the chair from rolling and slams into one of the shelves. Several small objects shaped like paper cranes tumble towards him, but before they can hit him, they flap their paper wings, flying back to their places on the shelf.

But Soobin doesn’t stop to even watch them. He stares right at Beomgyu. “Yeonjun? As in, Choi Yeonjun?”

“Do we know another?” Beomgyu plucks one defective paper crane off the floor, turning it over to look at the fishing-line-thin muscle mechanism in its wings.

“How is he? Where is he now? What’s he doing? Did he seem-”

“He’s a fucking Ranger. In the outpost my niece did her practicum at. The middle of nowhere.”

That silences Soobin for a whole minute.

Beomgyu puts the paper crane on the workbench, still frowning at it. “I just don’t know _why_ he would-”

“He probably still hasn’t been able to get psych clearance.”

Beomgyu turns to Soobin. There’s something about the way Soobin’s looking at the clutter on the floor that’s making Beomgyu uncomfortable. “You knew about this?”

Soobin keeps staring at the floor. But he doesn’t deny it.

“That’s enough, thank you,” Chaeryeong says, giving the flower seller a sweet smile as she takes the bundle of mums from him. She taps her credit fob against the seller’s POS terminal. “Thank you. Have a good day.”

“You too, miss.”

Chaeryeong walks into the Fleet’s Memorial to find it comfortingly empty. She doesn’t know what she would’ve done if there had been a lot of other people there.

**_State Fleet Memorial_ **

_→ East Wing_

_↑ North Wing_

_↓_ _South Wing_

_← West Wing_

_→ Pearl Wing_

Chaeryeong stares at the words engraved into the wall across her as if she can’t read them. Sure, she’s a bit rusty with her Moon, but she understands it well enough.

It’s just occurred to her that she doesn’t even know where Jeongin’s crypt is.

She sits down on the first bench she can find and pulls her phone out.

_Who was I even planning to call?_

Chaeryeong sits there staring at her phone, feeling the flowers’ stems going limp in her hands.

“Hello? Is it okay to call? Oh, good. Perfect, actually.” Chaeryeong laughs nervously. “No, there’s no emergency, don’t worry.”

Chaeryeong turns the flower over in her free hand. Some petals tumble to the floor, so Chaeryeong stops abruptly.

“I was wondering if you could ask around and find out where the um…” Chaeryeong finds it hard to talk. Her throat’s closed up. “Yes, sorry, I’m still here. There was an Academy ship seven years ago that… It’s called the _EXP Bravo_ , it was the last _EXP Bravo_. I just want to know which wing in the Memorial they’re um… Where are they?”

Chaeryeong grips the flower so hard that the stem crumples in her fist. “Yes, thank you. It’s nice to know Donghyeok’s fine, Captain Choi. Thanks again.”

Chaeryeong pockets her phone and cups one hand under the flower to save the petals that she can as she hurries into the Memorial’s East Wing.

She looks for the row Donghyeok’s father had given her over the phone.

But she stops before she enters the passageway, because there’s another figure already standing there, wearing a long traveler’s coat that brushes the floor.

The figure turns her way, their dusty gray coat parted to reveal the navy-blue uniform of a Fleet pilot.

“Chaeryeong?”

“Please identify yourself.” Yeonjun says, watching the dot on the screen keep moving closer and closer to their outpost. “This is Ranger Captain Choi Yeonjun of Fleet Outpost FPO-4417. Please identify yourselves.”

“Don’t bother, that ship passes by here every three weeks,” Ranger Soon says, propping his boots up on the edge of the dashboard. “It’s just carrying Earthers to a mining asteroid.”

Yeonjun stops typing for a moment to stare at the other ranger’s boots until he respectfully lowered them back to the floor.

“Thank you.” Yeonjun says as he hits the enter key.

The dot of the unidentified ship comes to a halt.

Yeonjun waits for the captain to complain or request he let them go, but he doesn’t get so much as silence. He checks the transmission connections.

“They don’t bother connecting sometimes.” Ranger Soon sighs. “Just let them go, Yeonjun, the workers on that ship are probably cramped as hell-”

“Your ship has been momentarily stalled by a weak tow field, but I’ll lift it once we can verify-” Yeonjun’s mouth hangs open as the dot on the screen starts moving again.

Ranger Soon crosses one leg over the other, watching the screen with his eyes only half-open. “Your tow field’s broken, Cap.”

“No.” Yeonjun checks the tow field’s sensors. Their outpost’s tow field is working fine. “It’s not.”

The dot continues traveling to the edge of the pink circle on the screen that represents the outpost’s tow field’s range. It’s moving at this slow, steady pace that seems to be insulting Yeonjun more than anything else.

 _No._ Yeonjun scrolls through the feed from the outpost’s other sensors.

“They’re almost out, Cap, just let them go.”

Yeonjun ignores Ranger Soon, stopping at the feed from the outpost’s cosmic ray sensor. It’s not getting tripped, which makes sense, since they’re too far from any significant sources of radiation to trip the alarm. _It should account for the usual noise and warmth from the ship… but it’s sensing some other EM field from the ship._

“Oop, there they go.”

Yeonjun frowns as the blinking dot of the cargo ship slips just out of the outpost’s range. _Dammit._

“Ranger Soon, please take over,” Yeonjun says, grabbing his jacket off the wall.

The other ranger makes a face. “Sure. But you’ll never catch up to them, Cap, just let them go.”

“Director Yoo, may I have clearance to pursue an unidentified ship with Cruiser Alpha?” Yeonjun says, holding the comms mic on his collar close to his mouth.

“Yeonjun? I’m just finishing my lunch.” The director’s frail voice crackles over the comms.

“With all due respect, the ship is getting away, ma’am.” Yeonjun’s already standing at the door to the outpost’s main cruiser ship.

“Who are you taking with you?”

“No one, Director.” Yeonjun says. In his mind’s eye he can see a lidar screen tracking a blinking dot that slides further and further away from the rectangle that is the outpost.

“Go call one of the others to come with you.”

“Ranger Soon is manning the transmission booth, Rangers Kang and Yoon are cleaning the mess hall, the two Ranger Lees are filing away our logs for the week, and Ranger Captain Jeon is still on paternity leave, ma’am.” Yeonjun says in one breath. He’s worried the director may not have picked it up the first time, and she’ll ask him to say it again. “I’ll head out alone, Director Yoo, then call for backup if necessary."

He hears nothing from the director’s end of the comms.

“Director Yoo?”

The director doesn’t reply.

“Hello? Ma’am?”

_Dammit._

Yeonjun begins punching in the code to unlock the cruiser. _This isn’t against the rules. I could just be doing a routine check-up of the cruiser. I could be taking it for a test drive. Nothing wrong with that._

He enters the cruiser’s one room, a rounded triangle-shaped space with one pilot’s seat at the front end, a small holding cell near the back, and nothing else.

He straps himself into the pilot’s seat, switching the comms on first. “Ranger Soon, this is Ranger Captain Choi. I’m just taking Cruiser Alpha out for a test drive.”

Yeonjun frowns at the cruiser’s comms display. Everything seems to be working fine.

“Ranger Soon, this is Ranger Captain Choi. Please reply.”

Yeonjun doesn’t even get static. _What the hell?_

He looks out of the cruiser’s windshield. He can just barely make out the tail end of the bumpy, dull alloy exterior of the cargo ship, but it’s almost completely out of his view already.

Yeonjun closes his eyes.

_I’m already a ranger in the Fleet’s most isolated outpost._

Seunghee appears in his mind, half a ramen noodle hanging out of her mouth. ‘ _You’re already the bottom of the heap, what can they do?’_

Yeonjun feels part of his soul die as he disengages the cruiser. He allows the ship to drift idly into space until he’s a safe distance from the outpost before firing up the ship’s thrusters.

 _I’m already at the lowest of the low,_ Yeonjun chants in his mind as he directs the cruiser towards the cargo ship in the distance. _I’m already the bottom of the barrel-_

Beomgyu’s voice echoes in his mind. _‘And you’re_ proud of it _? You can always go lower!_ ’

Yeonjun doesn’t even want to imagine it. He pushes forward on the thruster, feeling the cruiser jump up to maximum speed.


	20. The Enemy

Chaeryeong nearly drops the limp flowers in her hands. “Shin Ryujin?”

“Oh my _god_! Chaeryeong!” Ryujin does a little jig in the air before running over with her arms wide. “Chaeryeong! Oh my god! It’s really you!”

“Stop yelling, this is like, sacred ground or something,” Chaeryeong laughs, accepting a hug from the becloaked creature that is Shin Ryujin. She tries to push the most of Ryujin’s big, heavy cloak out of the way. “What is all this?”

“Oh, it’s a raincoat.”

Chaeryeong frowns. “It doesn’t rain on the Moon.”

“No, but the ship I’m on has had a leak problem and it’s pretty nasty.” Ryujin sticks out her tongue.

Chaeryeong smiles. Trust Shin Ryujin to show her tongue in a cemetery.

“Did you come here for someone?” Chaeryeong asks as she scans through the names on the crypts on the wall. Ryujin didn’t seem to be close to anyone on the _Bravo_ , as far as Chaeryeong knows.

“Yeah, one of my friends in the ship I’m on died last month, so I was looking for him.”

“Oh.” A hand flies to Chaeryeong’s mouth. “I’m so sorry, Ryujin.”

“I mean, it’s actually pretty chill, I’m okay, but thanks.” Ryujin shrugs, but the furrow in her brow doesn’t ease up. “I’ve looked all over the damn Memorial, but I guess he’s just not here.”

“Maybe not yet,” Chaeryeong says gently.

“Maybe.” Ryujin looks at the name on the nearest crypt. Then she looks at Chaeryeong with her eyes wide. “Oh.”

Chaeryeong gives her friend a sad smile. “Yeah, I’m here for him.”

She tries to arrange what’s left of the mums she’d bought on the ledge under the crypt. _They look like they’ve been stepped on._

_Yang Jeongin_

_2198 - 2217_

_Doctor and Medical Officer_

Chaeryeong folds her hands in front of her and stares at the engraved letters until they stop making sense to her.

For some reason, the tears aren’t coming.

“I’ll, uh, I’ll give you a minute.” Ryujin says. “I’ll wait for you at the entrance to the wing. Over there.”

Chaeryeong follows Ryujin’s finger to the end of the hallway, some fifty meters away. “Yeah, thanks. We need to catch up.”

“We do.” Ryujin nods. Then she spins on her boot, which squeaks on the polished stone floor. Clearly embarrassed by the noise, she starts tiptoeing down the rest of the way.

Chaeryeong looks back at the crypt.

“Hi Jeongin.” Chaeryeong’s voice is steadier than she expects it to be. She surprises herself so much that she forgets what she was going to say next. “Uh…”

“It’s been a while.” Chaeryeong says, glancing downwards. “Fifteen kilograms of a while. Though I don’t think you’d mind.”

She smirks.

“You big old greaseball.” She lifts a hand to touch the cool steel of the crypt. “I have good and bad news for you.”

She pauses for a reply she knows isn’t coming.

“Good news is that I haven’t really dated anyone since… you know, _you_ ,” Chaeryeong says, caressing the surface of the crypt with one finger. “Bad news is I haven’t really dated anyone since you. You’ve cursed my love life forever, congrats.”

All she gets is a faint echo of her own voice.

“I’m just kidding. I’ve been keeping myself busy, you know, to not think about you. But I always think about you anyway. And the dream came back.” Chaeryeong sees her own warped reflection in the engraving of Jeongin’s name. “So I’m going to think about you, and I’m not going to stop myself. Because so much doesn’t make sense. And I think I need to get answers before I can finally move on. No offense.”

Chaeryeong looks at her funny face reflected in the engravings.

“Because I’m such a nerd, right? I need all the answers, always.” Chaeryeong laughs before catching herself and clamping herself on the mouth. “Sorry. I forgot I had to be serious. Ryujin ruined everything.”

She cocks her head to one side.

“You know, it’s so weird that she’s here. Did you send Ryujin to me?” Chaeryeong pauses. “Why?”

Chaeryeong doesn’t get a reply, but she smiles anyway.

“Nice talking to you again, Jeongin.” She lays her palm flat over Jeongin’s name. “I miss you so much. Still.”

She blinks, hard.

“I’ll be back when I have the answers.” Chaeryeong whispers, leaning her forehead on the crypt. The metal feels like ice against her skin, but comfortingly so. It reminds her of those cool compresses her parents would put on her when she had a fever. “Then I’ll say goodbye for real. Until then, I still love you.”

“I hate you. I’m not talking to you.”

Beomgyu rolls over in bed to whack the control panel of the window.

A bright display of an artificially moonlit night replaces the view of distant stars beyond the _Descant_. The lamps in the bedroom turn up to full brightness, until it’s almost as bright as if they had entered a small star. Beomgyu pulls the covers up over his face. “Try sleeping now, bitch.”

Soobin sighs, leaning on the door to their bedroom. “I wasn’t trying to hide it from you, I just didn’t know how to tell you-”

“ _I know what happened to Yeonjun, your closest friend, whom you care about more than your own damn self,_ ” Beomgyu mutters in a bad approximation of Soobin’s low mumble. “ _I let them call him crazy and demote him to basically hell._ ”

“I didn’t actually have a say in the matter. And Yeonjun really _does_ have PTSD,” Soobin sits on his side of the bed. He peels the covers back to frown at Beomgyu. “You probably do, too, my love.”

Beomgyu scoffs, his eyes still screwed shut like he’s trying to force himself to sleep. “Are you going to have them flunk my psych eval for the Reshuffling? Am I going to go join Yeonjun?”

“Beomgyu-”

“Is everyone you’ve ever slept with going to end up on Outpost 4417?”

Soobin doesn’t reply, but Beomgyu feels the mattress shift under him. _Where’s he gone?_

Beomgyu hears something in front of him.

He cracks one eye open to find Soobin sitting on the floor beside the bed, watching Beomgyu earnestly.

Beomgyu shuts his eye again. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“Nothing.” Soobin says. “I’m going to sit here until you’re ready to talk to me.”

Beomgyu snuggles into his pillow to at least pretend to sleep and ignore him, but then he realizes something.

He sits up in bed, glaring down at Soobin. It’s a nice feeling, looking down on a taller man. “Are you using de-escalation techniques on me?”

“I’m just trying to have a civil conversation-”

“You fucking are.” Beomgyu crosses his arms. “I can’t believe you. My own fucking boyfriend is treating me like a fucking radical.”

Soobin frowns. “That’s not something to joke about-”

“Well joke’s on you, Kim fucking Soobin!” Beomgyu says, standing on the bed. “I will _never_ de-escalate. I’m going to be angry for-fucking-ever!”

Soobin keeps frowning up at Beomgyu, who has to crouch a little bit, since he’s hit the ceiling of their cabin. Soobin can only keep frowning for around half a second before he starts laughing.

“Stop laughing at me! Is that what they teach captains now? Laugh at the fucking enemy?” Beomgyu grumbles, climbing down to sit at the edge of the bed.

Soobin gets up on his knees, smiling at Beomgyu. “Since when were we enemies, my love?”

“Since you threw the love of my life under the fucking bus for his whole fucking life, you _stranger_!”

Soobin laughs, sliding his hands around Beomgyu’s waist. The latter doesn’t stop him. “Oh. I see.”

“Don’t say _‘I see_ ’, you don’t see shit,” Beomgyu looks up at the ceiling to avoid Soobin’s gaze. “Fine. I said it already anyway. I’m still in love with Yeonjun, it’s the worst fucking thing ever. I thought I was over all that bullshit but when I saw him again last week it was like I was 20 again and I- I’m such a fucking loser I swear…”

Beomgyu catches himself just then, and slowly, carefully frowns down at Soobin. His boyfriend lets a lot of things go, he knows it, but surely even Soobin draws the line at Beomgyu saying something like _that_.

Soobin laughs. It catches Beomgyu so off-guard that Beomgyu scrambles backwards on the bed in fear.

“So,” Soobin says, sitting at the edge of the bed. “What does that make me?”

“What?”

Soobin takes Beomgyu by the waist and pulls him closer. “If Yeonjun’s the love of your life, what am I?”

Beomgyu falls back against the mattress, swallowing thickly. “My enemy.”

Soobin props himself up with one hand, tracing the edge of Beomgyu’s face with the other. “How do I go back to not being your enemy, my love?”

“This is Ranger Captain Choi Yeonjun of Fleet Outpost FPO-4417,” Yeonjun says, slowing the cruiser down to glide alongside the cargo ship. “Please identify yourself, cargo vessel.”

Yeonjun doesn’t even get static. He tries contacting the outpost again, but gets nothing but silence.

Yeonjun pushes the cruiser forward until he comes in the view of the cargo ship’s cockpit. The ship itself seems to be a patchwork of two different ships: a Class C cargo craft outfitted for frozen goods, and a Class D ferry, like the one Yeonjun had taken to and from the Moon.

He flashes the blinkers on the wings of the cruiser. _Surely the captain of the cargo ship sees_ this _. Surely._

“This is Ranger Captain Choi Yeonjun of Fleet Outpost FPO-4417,” Yeonjun says, keeping his voice calm. “Please identify yourself, cargo-”

Yeonjun doesn’t get to finish his sentence, because the cargo ship jerks suddenly to the side.

The side where Yeonjun’s cruiser is.

He feels the vibrations through the wall and floor of the cruiser as the cargo ship rams into it.

_Oh shit._

The lights in the cargo ship switch to red as several warning sirens begin blaring in Yeonjun’s ears.

“Let’s stop here,” Ryujin says, nodding to a café on her right. It seems to be empty, save for a gloomy robot barista stacking empty cups out of sheer boredom.

“Is it any good?” Chaeryeong asks.

“Oh, no fucking clue,” Ryujin laughs as she leans one shoulder on the door to hold it open for Chaeryeong. “Haven’t been back on the Moon since the last Reshuffling.”

Chaeryeong lifts both eyebrows. “Don’t you get two weeks off every year?”

“I converted them to credit.” Ryujin grins. “Had to buy my mom a new house ‘cause the neighbors didn’t believe her when she said I was a Fleet pilot.”

“So they believe her now?”

“No, she’s just got new neighbors.” Ryujin laughs as she presses the button for a caramel macchiato. “What’re you getting? My treat.” Ryujin wags a worn-out credit fob in the air.

“Oh, I’ll have a peppermint mocha, please, thanks.” Chaeryeong gives the robot barista friendly smile, but the barista’s holo-projected face remains as bored as ever. She never liked robot servers, so she’s glad they never took off on Earth. _Well, not in my dome, at least._

Ryujin carries both of their drinks to a seat by the window. The chairs are so soft that the two of them sink almost to their waists, shifting around in mild discomfort.

“So, uh,” Chaeryeong wiggles around until her butt isn’t a foot deep in the cushion. “Are you on leave until the new assignments are out?”

“Hm?” Ryujin stops sipping her steaming-hot drink. “What?”

“It’s a Reshuffling year, right?” Chaeryeong frowns at her watch to check the date. It’s been the same year for months now, but she just has to be _sure_.

“Oh, yeah. Yeah.” Ryujin laughs as she lowers her mug. “I’m not on leave. I quit.”

Chaeryeong frowns. “Quit… the ship?”

“No, the whole damn Fleet.” Ryujin leans back, sinking deep into the backrest’s cushion with a smug grin on her face. “Fuck the Fleet, fuck them all, I’m done with them.”

Chaeryeong folds her hands in her lap, resisting the urge to wring them. She knows she doesn’t have the high ground to say anything to Ryujin about quitting the Fleet when she never joined it in the first place, but it just doesn’t seem right coming from Ryujin.

“Did something happen?”

“Aw, no, nothing happened.” Ryujin said. “That’s why I quit.”

Chaeryeong frowns. “What do you mean.”

“Our ship’s been leaking all over for five years now. It’s not some, I dunno, some fucking _outpost_ , okay? We’re a fucking _gigaship_. No one’s done a damn thing about it no matter how hard we complained, _four_ janitors have died from the mold, and no one higher up or even below seems to give a shit.” Ryujin’s eyebrows furrow. “And they couldn’t even fucking bury a single one of them in the Memorial.”

Chaeryeong warms her hands on the sides of her mug. “Were they from Earth?”

“Yeah.” Ryujin says. She smiles a little. “They were always talking trash about me in their language during lunch ‘cause I didn’t understand. But I did. Kinda.”

Chaeryeong reaches out and holds one of Ryujin’s hands. “I’m sorry, Ryujin.”

Ryujin squeezes Chaeryeong’s hand. “They could’ve given them the fucking burial rites and shit. Even Academy cadets get that, why can’t they do that for janitors who served over ten years-”

She looks up at Chaeryeong nervously.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to talk shit about the _Bravo_ guys.” Ryujin mumbles quietly.

“I know you weren’t,” Chaeryeong smiles at Ryujin. “But your friends were probably buried on Earth so their families could visit them. It’s really hard to go all the way here. It took me almost two weeks to get here.”

“Oh.” Ryujin leans back in her seat, which swallows her up until she’s pretty much just an upset frown. “Where are you staying? And for how long?”

“I’m…” Chaeryeong purses her lips. _Maybe now’s not the time to say this. But what do I say???_ “I’m enlisting for the Fleet.”

Ryujin stares at her for a long moment of silence that Chaeryeong finds very unsettling coming from the pilot.

“I didn’t sign up.” Chaeryeong says. “After graduation. I didn’t even go.”

“I know.” Ryujin says. “I talked to Yeonjun. You stayed to open a family clinic.”

“Yeah, I did.”

Ryujin frowns. “You didn’t like working there?”

“Oh, no, I did.” Chaeryeong warms her hands on her mug again. “But I felt like, I know this is going to sound so rude after everything you’ve been through, but I feel like there’s still something I need to do. Or find out. I don’t want to say I feel like it’s fate, but it kinda feels like that. Does that sound stupid?”

Ryujin’s quiet for a long time again. Chaeryeong’s starting to think that maybe Ryujin’s just quieter than she used to be. _It_ has _been a while since I talked to her._

“No, it’s good that you know where you’re going. I never do.” Ryujin lets out a self-deprecating laugh. “I remember after grad Yeonjun asked me where I was going and I said, ‘Wherever I get assigned man, I dunno.’”

Chaeryeong finds that weird. “He really asked that?”

“Yeah, he wanted to stay in touch or something.”

Chaeryeong sits up excitedly. “Do you know where he is now?”

“Aw, no, I haven’t seen him since then, sorry,” Ryujin grimaces. “He’s probably doing fine, though, you know him.”

“Yeah.”

Yeonjun tries covering his ears to block out the sirens, but they seem to be digging right into his skull like a jackhammer. The cruiser’s artificial gravity keeps slipping, sending him floating one second then slamming him into the floor with the force of a few G’s the very next.

Yeonjun drags himself along the handles on the cabin’s wall to the back portion of the cruiser. He hits the emergency call button. “FPO-4417! It’s Yeonjun! This cargo ship just fucking rammed me! The cruiser’s-”

_Unable to contact emergency line,_ the display on the wall reads.

“Fuck!” Yeonjun shouts out loud, realizing he’s out of breath shortly afterward. The displays are crammed with so many warning windows that he can’t check the ship’s oxygen levels. _They’re fucked up, whatever they are._

The artificial gravity kicks in just then, throwing Yeonjun to the floor in a gasping heap.

He closes his eyes, unable to think with the cacophony of sirens and warnings filling the cruiser’s tiny cabin.

He’s starting to feel lightheaded. _No._

_Hell no._

_I’ll be fucking damned if I die in a fucking outpost cruiser because a fucking_ slaver _ship hit me._

Yeonjun pushes himself up off the floor. He clambers to the back of the ship, leaning his whole body into opening a compartment in the wall just as the artificial gravity fails again.

He barely manages to pull out the one exosuit inside, swimming in the thin air left in the cabin as he tries to get into it.

The artificial gravity returns, dropping him onto the ground. He quickly climbs into the exosuit and fastens the helmet on.

Yeonjun sits on the ground for a moment – well, he sits for as long as the artificial gravity is there, after that he floats aimlessly – as he catches his breath. The exosuit’s air supply has a weirdly fishy smell, but Yeonjun will take anything right now.

Yeonjun drags himself back to the front of the cruiser, looking out the windshield to get his bearings.

The cruiser, along with a few broken bits of cruiser, seem to be floating off into space after the impact. He can still see the cargo ship, but it’s some ways away.

Yeonjun’s blood boils as he straps himself back into the pilot’s seat. He takes the cruiser’s controls again, closing all the warning boxes as quickly as he can. He directs the cruiser straight for the cargo ship, using what’s left of the cruiser’s energy to bring it up to some speed.

Yeonjun watches the side of the cargo ship come into view, a patchwork of alloy that doesn’t seem strong enough to hold in space, but somehow it does. He adjusts the direction of the cruiser little by little, until it’s headed straight for a dark-colored panel.

Yeonjun’s had a lot of free time working in the Fleet’s most isolated outpost for the past seven years. That coupled with his access to the Fleet’s online academy and lack of friends among the other rangers could only end with one thing: Yeonjun has a master’s degree in spacecraft design, among others.

He hits the brakes at the last minute, turning the cruiser a full 180 degrees.

He shuts his eyes as the back of the cruiser, or what’s left of it, slams into the cargo ship.

Beomgyu slides the door to the R&D lab open. A handful of interns and junior researchers rise to greet him.

Beomgyu holds a hand up to silence them all. He’s not in the mood.

“B- But Senior Researcher-”

“Not today. Please.” Beomgyu grumbles.

He walks straight to his office and slams the door shut, locking himself in. _Was I_ that _annoying when I was their age?_

_Probably worse._

“Good morning, Beomgyu.”

On an ordinary day, Beomgyu would have jumped and grabbed the nearest thing to a weapon. Today is not one of those days. Beomgyu just continues taking his white lab coat off the rack. “’Morning, Director.”

The Director of the Fleet’s Research and Development Division leans back in Beomgyu’s office chair, wearing a wide grin.

Beomgyu checks on something he’d left in the dehydrator the day before.

The Director of the Fleet’s Research and Development Division clears his throat.

Beomgyu looks away from the dehydrator. “Yes, sir?”

“Are you not wondering why I’m here, Beomgyu?”

_No, sir, I’m not wondering about anything at all._ Beomgyu returns the strip of translucent material to the dehydrator and sets it at 70 degrees for another 12 hours, scribbling a note in his tablet.

Beomgyu hears his seat creak under the director. “How is the General’s son doing? Are you two still dating?”

Beomgyu slams his tablet down on the table. “With all due respect, Director Seo, just tell me what you want.”

The director lifts his eyebrows. “You broke up?”

“No.” Beomgyu glowers at the director. _If we broke up would my back be killing me this much on this damn morning? That’s right, it wouldn’t._ “What do you want, director?”

The director laughs. Then his expression shifts in a way Beomgyu doesn’t like. “As you may know, it’s the Reshuffling next month.”

“Our department is exempt from Reshuffling.”

“Yes, it is,” The director says slowly. “But I like timing the changes around here with the Reshuffling. Makes us feel more like part of the rest of the Fleet, right?”

_Why should we want to feel like the rest of them? We’re not. You can’t expect research to follow a timetable like the rest of the Fleet,_ Beomgyu thinks, but he just leans against one of his shelves, saying nothing.

“I’m retiring, and Dr. Cha is taking over as director.”

Beomgyu expected as much. Dr. Seo is old, and Dr. Cha’s much better at securing funding. _Maybe this is the year I get a junior researcher for my project._ Beomgyu almost smiles at the idea. _Finally_.

“I’m not technically allowed to say this to you, since it was discussed in a closed-door meeting, but I thought you had the right to know that she’s planning to terminate your project.”

“Pardon?” Beomgyu coughs, choking on thin air. “Dr. Cha is planning to _what_ now?”

“It’s not Dr. Cha, don’t get me wrong,” The director says nervously. “She’s just aligning to orders from above. You know. Orders From Above.”

Beomgyu wonders if there’s any actual benefit to dating the beloved son of the _highest_ source of Orders From Above. _I guess not_. “What are those orders?”

“The R&D department is pivoting to weapons research. What with the trouble radicals have been causing lately…”

“ _Trouble_?” Beomgyu scoffs. “People are dying, Director.”

“Ah, yes, of course.” The director nods solemnly. It looks practiced. Beomgyu was tired before, and now he’s just _exhausted_.

“So you’re telling me to apply somewhere else before it’s too late?” Beomgyu asks.

“Well, someone as sharp as you would do well in, eh,” The director shudders as he says, “ _Field work_.”

“The last time I did _field work_ …” Beomgyu takes a breath. He’s not going to let the director pity him more than he already does. “Sure. I’ll try applying to the _Descant_ ’s engineering department.”

“Oh, that’s a much better idea.” The director nods, rising from Beomgyu’s chair. “I’ll write you a glowing recommendation, Beomgyu. So sorry about your project, again.”

“Thanks.” Beomgyu pushes the door open. “Good day, Director.”

“You too, Beomgyu.” The director nods as he steps out. The throng of junior researchers who had been trying to listen in scramble away.

Beomgyu slams the door and locks it in their faces.

He collapses in his chair, looking up at the flowchart he’d written on the wall. Out of eighteen boxes, he’s only checked two so far. _And they’re going to kill my project here? Fuckers._

Beomgyu buries his face in his hands. _Fuck the radicals and their motherfucking mess. Fuck this shit._

He pulls out his phone, finger hovering above the button to call Soobin.

Beomgyu doesn’t press it. He realizes he doesn’t want Soobin’s gentle voice and comforting, but ultimately meaningless words.

He wishes he had Yeonjun’s number.

Yeonjun undoes the clasp of his seatbelt, falling into the darkness around him.

The he hits liquid.

There’s a current pulling him to his left, so he swims in the opposite direction, which is much easier said than done in an exosuit. But he’s not about to take the exosuit off anytime soon.

He finds something to hold onto, feeling the last of the liquid pulled towards his left, out into space. He has one thought: I’m going to have to pay _millions_ if they find out that was me.

Yeonjun climbs to his feet, activating the magnets in his gloves and boots to hold him against the alloy wall.

A shaft of light opens far above his head. Yeonjun starts climbing towards it, keeping close to the wall to stay out of view.

He makes it there just as the door to the shaft begins to slide shut.

Yeonjun jams his hand in the space, wincing as his knuckles crunch under the closing door.

He uses his other hand to wrench the door back open.

Then he pulls himself up and through the door. It slams shut under him.

He’s in a small gray room. There’s some faded writing on the wall that Yeonjun knows should read _Septic Tank Maintenance Room._ There’s also a person in an exosuit staggering back against the opposite wall.

Yeonjun reaches for his holster. His hand hits air where he was expecting to feel a gun. _God damn._

_God damn the outpost’s funding._

_We don’t even have stun guns?_

Yeonjun narrowly avoids a kick from the other person. He grabs the person by the ankle and twists them off balance, sending them slamming helmet-first into the control panel.

Yeonjun blocks the emergency alarm with his body.

The person scrambles to their feet, scowling up at Yeonjun. Their mouth’s moving, saying something Yeonjun obviously can’t hear.

_Oh. They’re saying ‘Fuck you’._

Yeonjun shrugs. _Makes sense._

He pins the other person against the wall with one hand, using the other to get the air supply in the maintenance room back on.

He unfastens his own helmet before the other person’s.

Then he immediately regrets it. _This room smells like… shit, obviously._

The other person’s gagging. “Why the fuck would you-”

“My name is Ranger Captain Choi Yeonjun.” Yeonjun says. “I’m sorry for using force, but-”

The other person’s eyes widen. “It’s a Fleetie. We’ve got a Fleetie on the ship.”

Yeonjun frowns. Cargo ship staff are usually given a handheld device to communicate. Even the most expensive cargo ships don’t have hands-free comms systems.

“Kill them.” A voice crackles from somewhere on the other person’s side of the room.

Yeonjun hits before he can even think. He jams the heel of his free hand into the person’s face, sending them reeling backwards. Then he clasps his hands together, bringing them down on the other person’s head like a mace.

The person crumples to the floor.

“Longnose?” The voice on the person’s comms system asks. “Longnose, have you gotten rid of them?”

Yeonjun only stares at the unconscious person’s slumped form.

“Longnose, don’t make me come over there, you piece of shit.”

_Earth._ Yeonjun realizes. _They’re speaking in Earth dialect._

“Longnose? Longnose? God dammit, Longnose, I don’t have time for your bullshit.”

Yeonjun kneels down and turns the person over slowly. He finds out where the sound is coming from. There’s a faint tattoo just behind the person’s ear, shaped like a circle with a cross in it. The tattoo is bulging slightly from something that’s been embedded just under the skin.

Yeonjun’s read enough news articles to know what the tattoo means. _They’re radicals._

“Longnose, I’m coming over there.”

_Shit._

⨁

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm on twitter if you wanna yell at me or see previews of the next chapters, [@halp_rice](https://twitter.com/halp_rice)
> 
> also puma destroyed my brain but also stream Go Live by stray kids it's a PERFECT album ❤


	21. Merryways Cargo Ship 45

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Turn that off.”

Yeonjun had never heard the outpost director speak so roughly with them. The other rangers stopped slurping up their porridge to frown at her, likewise.

“Turn it off.” The outpost director wagged a bony finger at the screen all the rangers had been watching. “Now!”

Yeonjun reached for the control panel and shut the TV off.

Ranger Soon slurped up some porridge, the sound deafening as the other rangers had fallen into a confused, respectful silence.

“I’ll have no more of it in this outpost.” The director said, glaring at the dead screen. “Do you understand?”

Ranger Kang frowned. “The news, ma’am?”

The outpost director only glared at him.

“Yes, ma’am.” Ranger Captain Jeon cut in, nudging the younger ranger with his elbow. He dipped into a deep bow. “We won’t do it again.”

The director turned on her heel and left the mess hall.

None of the rangers went back to their lunch, except Ranger Soon, who was scraping the bottom of his bowl. He looked at the other rangers’ bowls.

“Are you gonna eat that?”

Ranger Kang ignored him. “What’s the director’s problem with the news?”

“It’s not the news,” Ranger Captain Jeon said, sliding his half-eaten bowl to Ranger Soon. “She doesn’t like to hear about the radicals.”

“No one does.” The taller of the Ranger Lees said.

“They’re the reason why she got demoted to this outpost.” Ranger Captain Jeon said. “They took down her ship.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun sheds his exosuit, leaving it on the floor of the maintenance room. He looks down at his khaki jacket. It’s not well-tailored or well-kept (despite his best efforts), but it’s still got the Fleet patches on it.

Yeonjun unzips the jacket and dumps it on top of the exosuit.

He creeps along the corridors outside, hoping to find something that he can use to defend himself, but the cargo ship has nothing but damp and mold all over the walls and floor. He makes his way to a stairwell.

_This probably leads to the cargo hold._

Yeonjun shudders involuntarily thinking about the “cargo” a ship like this usually carries.

Voices coming from above snap him back to reality.

Yeonjun looks around the stairwell. Like the rest of the cargo ship, there wasn’t enough interior design put into it to give him anywhere to hide.

“Longnose has been pissing me off all damn day.” One of the voices says, accompanied by angry, heavy-footed stomps down the stairwell. “Have you gotten back in touch with the base?”

“No.” The other, gentler voice says, accompanied with much lighter footsteps. They’re also speaking in Earth dialect. “The bomb took out the cargo ship’s comms, too.”

“Dammit. Didn’t Fee fix that?”

“She was still working on it when we left.”

“Dammit. How is the princess doing?”

“She’s dumb as a rock. I don’t think she even realizes Junho’s one of us.”

“Good.”

Yeonjun waits for them to leave the stairwell before he lets go. He flexes his fingers and arms, which are cramping from hanging under the stairs.

He has no idea what to think, but he doesn’t have time to think, anyway. He climbs up the rest of the steps and exits the stairwell. He finds himself in a cramped hallway with three sets of padlocked double doors. Only the last set of double doors at the end isn’t locked.

Yeonjun’s stomach turns.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“They’re designed that way so the cargo doesn’t escape.”

Yeonjun had stopped taking notes. He stared at the professor in his little screen, who just kept talking. He couldn’t see Yeonjun, of course. This was a pre-recorded lecture.

“All four doors are opened when the ship lands to facilitate the disembarkation of the cargo-”

Yeonjun stopped the video.

“Hey Ranger Choi-” Ranger Yoon stopped in the doorway to the outpost’s sleeping quarters. “Oh, sorry are you in a call?” He mouths.

“No,” Yeonjun slid his headphones off. “Class.”

Ranger Yoon snorted. “Wasn’t four years at the Academy enough?”

Yeonjun closed his tablet and stowed it under his pillow. “Is it my shift already?”

“Yeah.” Ranger Yoon said. “You can bring your _class_ there, we don’t seem to have any traffic today, anyway.”

“No thanks.” Yeonjun shook his head. “Good night, Ranger Yoon.”

The other ranger saluted him lazily before dropping in the bed next to Yeonjun’s.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun waits by the set of unlocked double doors, pressed against the wall. He knows that only the ship staff – and probably the radicals who seem to have taken over the ship – have the access to open the door.

His knuckles and arms throb in pain, but he tries to ignore them.

The door swings open eventually.

“What do you _mean_ Longnose is knocked out?”

Yeonjun holds onto the doorknob, keeping himself safely hidden behind the breadth of the door.

The radical who stomps out into the hallway doesn’t notice him anyway. They’re too busy shouting into their comms. “All of you are fucking dead when I find you!”

Yeonjun sees the gun in their hands. It doesn’t look like it stops at stunning people.

Yeonjun slips around the door and into the cargo hold.

A hundred or so radicals are standing around the round cargo hold, one stationed every five degrees or so, like numbers on a protractor. The one who must have been the one closest to the door must have also been the one who’d just rushed out, since there isn’t a radical standing near where Yeonjun’s just entered. None of the others notice him, because they’re too busy trying to keep an eye on the hundreds of people crammed into the hold. At first glance, Yeonjun figures they must be around six hundred people, all seated on the floor, since there isn’t enough space to lay down.

Yeonjun quickly joins them, ignoring the mildly curious looks from the people around him.

The people seated in the cargo hold easily outnumber the radicals, five or six to one. But the radicals have guns hanging off their shoulders, twice the size of the biggest one Yeonjun had been trained to use in the Academy.

_I can’t call the other rangers for help. They’d probably only get killed._ Yeonjun remembers the two radicals’ conversation in the stairwell. _And they seem to have disabled the comms._

_I can’t call anyone for help._

“Excuse me, you’re sitting on my coat.” The woman behind Yeonjun grumbles.

“Sorry.” Yeonjun frowns. Speaking the Earth dialect after so long feels strange in his mouth. He shifts his weight so the woman can tug her coat out from under him.

“Thank you.” The woman says, and Yeonjun expects her to stop there. She pokes Yeonjun in the back, lowering her voice as she asks, “Are you alone?”

Yeonjun turns partway to frown at her. “Pardon?”

“Are you alone?” The woman asks again. “Or are there other Fleet officers outside?”

Yeonjun shakes his head numbly. He frowns at his clothes. He’s wearing a white t-shirt and crumpled khaki pants dirtied beyond recognition. _How does she know?_

“Here.” The woman holds out her coat. “Wear this.”

“I’m not co-” Yeonjun stops himself from saying something stupid. He slips the woman’s roughly hewn coat on. It fits, but just barely. “Thank you.”

“There seem to be a hundred and twelve of them from my last count. I can probably take one or two of them down,” The woman sighs as she looks over the radicals standing all along the walls of the cargo hold. “You should’ve brought backup.”

Yeonjun says nothing. A hundred and twelve is a lot for him to deal with, even if this woman _does_ help him. He’d probably knock one or two out before they shoot him. _But if she’s one of_ them _, I’m just a dead man walking. Sitting._

Yeonjun studies the radical nearest him, some five meters away. He could take their gun, but he’d be shot before he could even think about firing it.

He settles into his seat, feeling the seams of the woman’s coat straining around him.

The door behind him opens, and he ducks his head, pretending to have dozed off.

“New plan: We’re calling the General now.” The radical says, probably into their intercom.

Yeonjun stays slumped over, but he frowns.

“But I thought we were waiting until we got back to the touchpoint-”

“What about _New_ _Plan_ do you not understand? The Fleet’s already onto us.”

“What?”

“Doughboy,” The radical grumbles into their comms. “Contact the General now.”

Yeonjun doesn’t move, but he feels the woman next to him tense up.

“Bring the princess to the cockpit.”

Yeonjun pretends to sit up groggily, squinting as he hears shouting across the cargo hold. He doesn’t need to act much, because everyone around him’s looking that way, too.

A woman’s being dragged to her feet by one of the radicals. She’s wearing a threadbare coat, and from this distance, Yeonjun has no idea who she is.

“Junho!” She yells. “Junho!”

A man, who must have been sitting next to her, stands up.

“Don’t let them take me, Junho-”

The woman stops screaming, because the man’s taken her by the arm. He nods to the radical holding her other arm, murmuring something Yeonjun can’t hear from this far away.

“Shit.” The woman next to him curses under her breath. They do nothing but watch as the radical and the man drag the woman out of the cargo hold through the double doors behind them. The woman is crying, but the man just stares straight ahead without so much as a frown.

Yeonjun’s got things half figured out, but he doesn’t have time to think it through. He gives the man next to him a rough push.

The man, a stocky, burly tree trunk of a man probably a whole head taller than Yeonjun, rises to his feet. “Who the _fuck_ -”

“Sit down!” The radical to Yeonjun’s left yells, but it sounds like a squeak after the burly man’s voice. “Sit do-”

The burly man lunges for Yeonjun, knocking him into the woman behind him.

“What the hell are you doing!” One of the people next to them grumbles, trying to get out of the way, but there’s nowhere to go.

“There’s not enough space as it is!” A man yells.

“Inconsiderate pig!” A woman yells.

“Sit down!” A radical yells. “Stop-”

The man grabs Yeonjun by the collar. Yeonjun braces himself, but the punch he receives in the face still makes his head spin for a moment.

Then he dodges another punch, leveraging the man’s weight to throw him towards the radical who’s been screaming at them to sit back down. The other people around them rise to their feet then, shouting and pushing each other.

Yeonjun ducks out of another punch from the burly man, which lands on the radical’s nose instead with a sickening crunch.

Yeonjun jumps to push the doors open.

“Stop them!”

Yeonjun hears the fizzle of a laser blast on the wall next to him. The people around him drop to the floor, screaming as more laser blasts ring out.

Yeonjun feels something hit one of his shoulder blades. The pain stings at first, then sears into his muscle, sending him crumpling to his knees.

“Come on.” The woman drags Yeonjun out into the hallway with one arm, using the other to cock the gun she’d stolen from the radical. “We have to get to the cockpit.”

Yeonjun climbs to his feet. He’s never been shot by a laser blast before, but if there’s any small mercy in it, at least the wound doesn’t bleed. “End of this hallway, hang left, up the stairs.”

The woman nods curtly, holding the gun ahead of her as she starts down the hallway.

Yeonjun follows after, trying to ignore the pain from every corner of his body. “There’s an anteroom before the cabin itself. They’ll have put guards there, definitely.”

Yeonjun smells burnt hair. He realizes it’s his own hair, since a laser blast had missed his ear by literally a few hairs’ breadth.

He pushes the radical’s gun to the side, sending their next laser blast aimlessly into the wall. He twists the gun out of their grasp and slams the butt of it into their stomach.

The radical bends over, and Yeonjun uses that moment to slam the gun into the side of their head.

The woman, who’s stepping over a similarly unconscious radical, frowns at Yeonjun for a second. “Are you Special Forces?”

“Outpost ranger.” Yeonjun gasps out. He hasn’t done this much physical activity in years.

The woman looks bewildered for only a half second. Then she lifts the unconscious radical’s arm to open the door to the cockpit. “No one move!”

Yeonjun aims his gun directly at the person sitting at the ship’s controls. _She’s the one who rammed my cruiser. Bitch._

The woman’s aimed her gun right for the woman sitting on the floor, bound with worn carbon fiber cords. It’s the woman who had been dragged out of the cargo hold.

“No one move or I shoot her.”

The woman in threadbare coat yells against the gag on her mouth.

There are four other radicals in the room. One is the pilot, who’s turned away from her station to stare nervously down the barrel of Yeonjun’s gun. Another is the man in the leather jacket, who now has a gun of his own, aimed right at Yeonjun. The third is bent over the cargo ship’s comms panel, shaking like a leaf. The fourth is a large woman with arms as thick as Yeonjun’s legs, aiming her gun right at the woman Yeonjun had arrived with.

The large woman growls, “You have no idea what you’re do-”

“If you don’t stand down,” The woman beside Yeonjun says. “I _will_ shoot her.”

The woman tied up on the floor whimpers, squeezing her eyes shut.

The man in the leather jacket scoffs. “The General will have you killed-”

“I know.” The woman lowers her finger onto the trigger. The gun lets out a low hum as it charges up. “But you’ll all get killed, too, and get nothing for it.”

“She’s bluffing.” The large woman says, putting her finger to her own trigger. “Don’t-”

The large woman shrieks out in pain, crumpling to a heap on top of the woman on the floor, who starts screaming against her gag.

The woman beside Yeonjun seems too stunned to move for a second, so Yeonjun spins his smoking gun and knocks it right into the man in the leather jacket’s fingers, sending the man’s shot off towards the ship’s dashboard. The radical operating the comms system gets shot in the knee, while the other scrambles away, screaming.

The man drops the gun and lunges for Yeonjun, but the woman next to him fires one shot right through his shoulder. He falls to the floor at Yeonjun’s feet, writhing in pain.

Yeonjun swings the gun to hit the pilot in the head, sending her falling to the floor, as well. She moans, but doesn’t get up again.

The woman hangs her gun off her shoulder, scowling at Yeonjun over all the groaning figures on the floor between them. “Have you never heard of de-escalation?”

Yeonjun ignores her, giving the large woman a blow to the head just as she clambers up onto her knees, cursing. She falls over, unconscious.

He sets the woman on the floor upright, frowning at the cords tied around her. “Are you all right?”

She nods vaguely, staring at him with her large, pretty eyes.

Yeonjun’s dragged the last of the radicals out of the cockpit. He closes the door behind him. Then he walks over to the dashboard and begins typing into the pilot’s station.

“What are you-”

The lights in the cabin go dark, save for the pulsing light of the dashboard and a few dim emergency light strips on the floor.

Something begins banging on the door to the cockpit. The woman lifts her gun, aiming it right at the door.

“Don’t bother. They can’t open it.” Yeonjun says.

The banging stops.

The woman frowns at him. “What did you do?”

“I made the ship think a hole’s been punched in the hull.” Yeonjun sets the ship on autopilot for the nearest ferry station. “Air supply’s been lowered everywhere except the cockpit, just enough to render everyone unconscious. I supplied a little more to the… hold to account for the number of people there.”

The woman steps back warily. “Did you say you were a _ranger_?”

Yeonjun holds down to record a transmission. “This is Ranger Captain Choi Yeonjun of Fleet Outpost FPO-4417. I’m on _Merryways_ Cargo Ship 45, which had been taken over by radicals. They have been subdued, and I have directed the ship to dock at Ferry Station 398. There are over a hundred radicals here and around 600 workers from Earth being held hostage-”

“And the General’s second daughter.” The woman says, nodding at the woman still tied up on the floor.

“-And the General’s second daughter, Miss Kim Eunbi.” Yeonjun says. “We are requesting immediate assistance from any Fleet ship. Thank you.”

He sends out the transmission.

The woman on the floor frowns. “How did you know it was me?”

Yeonjun looks back at her. She must’ve had a lot of work done on her face. “I didn’t.”

“Captain, you wanted to see Ranger Choi?”

Yeonjun doesn’t bother correcting the officer who’d led him to the bridge of the _EXP Ritardando._ Yeonjun’s never been on a megaship before, and the sheer size of the bridge – with the captain’s raised dais on a balcony above hundreds of navigators, engineers, and pilots below – suddenly seems like a waste of space to him.

“He’s a Ranger _Captain_.”

Yeonjun smiles at the woman standing next to the _Ritardando_ ’s captain. She’s changed out of her worker disguise and into a smoky light gray uniform that has nothing but an embroidered white rose on the left chest panel.

“Agent Miyawaki Sakura of the General’s Security Service.” The woman bows gracefully before extending a hand. “Your help in rescuing Miss Eunbi was invaluable.”

“What?” The _Ritardando_ ’s captain laughs. “I think the ranger was _rather_ helpful, Agent Miyawaki.”

Yeonjun ignores the captain and shakes the agent’s hand. “Likewise, Agent Miyawaki.”

“This is Captain Choi Yeonjong of the _EXP Ritardando_ ,” The officer who’s ushered Yeonjun in says, gesturing respectfully towards the captain, who doesn’t bother getting out of his chair.

He gives Yeonjun a sloppy nod and a grin. “Seems like we’re just a syllable off from each other’s names, Ranger Choi Yeon _jun_.”

“Oh, but we’re very different, Captain.” Yeonjun says. His face stays blank, but Agent Miyawaki cracks a half-smile.

“Of course, Ranger,” The megaship’s captain laughs again. It’s beginning to grate against Yeonjun’s ears. “I was in the Top 50 of my class at the Academy, outposts were never even an option for me.”

Yeonjun can’t help himself. “I came in third.”

The megaship’s captain gapes at him.

“I meant to ask, Captain Choi,” Agent Miyawaki pipes up suddenly. “What became of the radicals we subdued-”

“Oh, they’ve filled up our prisons. We’re bringing them back to the _Descant_.”

Agent Miyawaki frowns. “I thought all trials were still conducted on the Moon base.”

“What’s the point of a trial when they’ve already told us all we need to know?”

The agent looks at the floor, deeply troubled.

“Captain Choi,” Yeonjun says. “What about the workers? Are they all well?”

“Who?”

“The workers who were being transported by the ship.” Yeonjun begins to sweat even in the controlled temperature of the _Ritardando_ ’s bridge. “The ones from Earth.”

“Ah, the cargo.” The megaship’s captain shrugs. “I don’t know.”

The officer standing next to Yeonjun mumbles, “They med team just finished checking them all. They’re fine.”

“Thank you.” Yeonjun gives the officer a grateful nod. He looks up at the megaship’s captain. “Captain Choi, I’m very grateful for all your help thus far-”

“Oh, it’s not a problem, Ranger, it’s all in the job.”

Yeonjun nods, biting down on a response he thinks of just then. “May I borrow a light spacecraft to return to the outpost?”

The megaship’s captain slouches forward in his chair, frowning at Yeonjun. “ _Borrow_? And how the hell will you _return_ -”

“Captain Choi-” Agent Miyawaki’s mouth twitches. “I mean, Ranger Captain Choi, the General has requested to thank you personally at the _Descant_.”

Yeonjun frowns at her.

“Just the ranger?” The megaship’s captain scowls. “What about the rest of us? After all we’ve done, and we’ve got a hundred fucking radicals to deal with-”

“You can bring it up with the General when we arrive at the _Descant_ , Captain.” Agent Miyawaki turns to Yeonjun like she’s tired of the other captain’s face. “General Kim sincerely wishes to meet you there, Ranger Captain Choi.”

Yeonjun bows. “Who am I to deny the General’s wishes?”

Agent Miyawaki has the faintest smile when he looks at her again.


	22. Green

Yeonjun looks out through the window of the cabin he’s been given, which he’s beginning to think may be nothing more than a supply closet with a window. _No, you know for a fact that no ship has a supply closet with a window._

The rainbow colors of the warp tunnel fade to give way to the familiar dark expanse of space.

Yeonjun smiles at the stars. Even after all these years, they still give him that warm feeling, like he’d had a couple pints of beer.

The _Ritardando’s_ announcement system buzzes to life. “This is your Captain Choi Yeonjong speaking,”

Yeonjun’s glad he hasn’t had to see the captain’s face for a week now, but did he _have_ to make announcements every ten minutes or so?

“We are approaching the Fleet Base _Descant_. We’ll be docked in uh, how much longer, Engineer Yang?”

There’s a low hum as the captain waits for the engineer to reply.

“We’ll be docked in twenty minutes. No one’s gonna be allowed to get off the ship until all the radical prisoners are transferred, so it’s going to take a little longer than that before we can get down.”

Yeonjun plucks the jacket hanging off a peg on the wall. They hadn’t had any fresh ranger uniforms on the _Ritardando_ for obvious reasons, so they’d given Yeonjun the sickly brown uniform of the janitors, for reasons that are also obvious.

Yeonjun couldn’t care less. He slips into his jacket and zips it up. The janitors’ uniforms are built more for comfort than appearance, anyway.

The display in the window of his cabin lights up. _Incoming call from Cabin 287 – Miyawaki Sakura._

Yeonjun taps the button on the control panel to accept the call. “Hello, Agent Miyawaki.”

“Hello, Ranger Captain Choi. We’ve been granted special permission to disembark immediately upon docking on Level 8. Meet you there in twenty minutes.”

“Okay. See you there, Agent.”

Yeonjun frowns when he steps out of the _Descant’_ s docking bay and finds himself standing on grass. It’s not a synthetic carpet. It’s real, irregular, wide-leafed grass.

He looks up to find the thousands of levels of the teraship wrapping around a large empty space in the center, like a cored apple. Strip lights shed artificial sunlight from above, just as they would in a dome, but this space is larger than any dome. The grass under his feet leads out to hills, valleys, and even a high peak shrouded in fog, reaching up towards the upper levels of the teraship. Water tumbles down from the edge of the peak, glinting in the artificial sunlight as it travels down the side of the mountain to collect in a lake probably a day’s travel away from where Yeonjun’s standing.

Even on Earth, Yeonjun’s never seen this much _space_. It’s beautiful, but something about it makes him feel sick.

“Ranger Captain Choi. The General isn’t a man you keep waiting.”

“Of course. Sorry.” Yeonjun stumbles after the agent, who’d stopped a few meters away when she realized he wasn’t following.

He follows the agent into a glass elevator some ten meters across, already crowded with people taking any of the available seats in the elevator. They strap themselves in by the wall, with a clear view of the terraformed space at the center of the _Descant_.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?”

Yeonjun nods. “Yes it is, sir.”

The General leans back in his seat. They’re in a private suite 2300 levels above the ground Yeonjun had been standing on earlier. The view from the window is foggy, and would have been blindingly bright it the window hadn’t been deeply tinted. The spray from the top of the waterfall splatters the glass at intervals that are so random they almost make Yeonjun believe they’re natural.

“You don’t like it, though.”

Yeonjun doesn’t say anything. He’s not about to talk shit about the crown jewel of the entire Fleet in front of the highest-ranking Fleet official. _I’m not that stupid._

“Every time I’m here, I tell Admiral Kim we’ve got better stuff on Earth. It’s complete bullshit, but you should see his face whenever I say it.” The General’s mouth curls into a smile, like he’s more amused at his own jokes than anyone else will ever be. Yeonjun’s seen it on broadcast so many times that expects to be used to it, but he finds himself smiling along. “He was the one who designed that atrium.”

“The Admiral, sir?” Yeonjun’s heard stories about the man running the _Descant._ They’re not stories of a landscape artist.

“Yes. His parents probably forced him to go to the Academy instead of art school.” The General shrugs. “It’d explain why he’s so grumpy all the time.”

Yeonjun nods vaguely. He doesn’t lean back or slouch at all. He doesn’t see how Agent Miyawaki can be so calm, mixing drinks at the bar across them. _She’s used to him, obviously. He’s her boss._

_No, it’s not that._ Yeonjun frowns at the General. Taken individually, his features look nothing like his son’s, but all together they make Yeonjun feel more than a little uneasy.

The General smiles. “I won’t waste any more of your time, Ranger Captain Choi, I know you hate this.”

Yeonjun shakes his head almost robotically. “O- Of course not, sir.”

“I look a lot like him, don’t I?” The General heaves a sigh. “It’s got to be pretty uncomfortable for you.”

Yeonjun shifts in his seat. _He’s not wrong._

“I just wanted to meet you personally, and thank you.” The General rises to his feet. Yeonjun scoots back warily. Then he frowns when the General bends over in a deep bow. “Thank you for bringing my daughter home.”

Yeonjun stands up. “Sir, there’s no need-”

“Sit down, Ranger Captain.”

Yeonjun hits the seat in half a second. “Yes, sir.”

The General holds his back, wincing as he straightens up. His back lets out a loud crack as he lowers himself into his chair.

“Are you all right, sir?” Agent Miyawaki asks as she pours a drink out of a shaker.

“Yes, Agent Miyawaki, thank you.” The General reaches behind him to tap his back a few times before leaning back again. He gives Yeonjun an amused smile. “I need to practice my bows again, what with the holidays coming up again.”

Yeonjun nods.

“Ranger Captain Choi, I hope you understand how deep my gratitude runs. My family- No, my children are the most important people in my life,” The General says. He sighs. “All my enemies know it.”

Yeonjun turns his gaze down respectfully to the pearlized table between them.

“My children have always been my biggest weakness,” The General lets out a self-deprecating laugh. “So anyone who risks their life to protect them is immediately absolved of even a crime so heinous as breaking my only son’s heart.”

Yeonjun looks up at the General, frowning. “Sir, I-”

The General breaks out laughing, slapping his knees. Even Agent Miyawaki’s lips curl into a grin.

“I’m just kidding, Ranger Captain Choi, sorry. Bad joke, I know.” The General takes a deep breath to stop himself from laughing, but his face is red from the effort. “In all seriousness, I truly am grateful for what you’ve done. I’ll see to it that you’re promoted to a fitting position-”

“General Kim.” Yeonjun cuts in, feeling his ears heat up with shame as he does. “I’m sorry, sir, but I don’t want special treatment. I applied for a promotion honestly and I’ll be deeply disappointed if I receive anything other than the due process expected of the Fleet administration.”

The General stares at him.

Yeonjun wishes he could open the window and fling himself down the waterfalls. _Might as well. They’re not going to let me live after accusing the fucking General of fucking corruption._

“Very well then,” The friendly lilt in the General’s voice is gone. “I’ll see to it that your application receives the due process it deserves.”

Yeonjun stands up, already thinking of how he’s going to get out of here. He bows deeply. “Thank you, General.”

“Agent Miyawaki, please show the ranger captain the way out.”

Chaeryeong leans her suitcase against the staircase. She leans on it to shout, “Mom! Dad! I’m home!”

She hears her parents’ footsteps as they shuffle towards the stairs in their soft house slippers. _How am I going to break it to them?_

_“Mom, Dad, remember when I said I was done with the Fleet? Well, I guess not after all.”_

Chaeryeong makes a face at herself.

Then she hears more frantic footsteps coming from the back of the house.

“Oh good, you’re here!” Her older sister says, reaching for the car keys in a bowl by the door. “Come on, we’ve got to go.”

“What? Why?”

“There’s an emergency at Madam Kim’s.”

Chaeryeong frowns. “But she was fine when I left-”

“Come on, Chaeryeong, _now_!”

“My dad’s here.” Soobin says.

Beomgyu stops brushing his teeth, frowning at the reflection of Soobin’s face in the mirror. “Wha? _Heew?_ _Now_?”

“Yeah.” Soobin nods. “Turns out the guy Eunbi-noona was eloping with was actually a radical.”

Beomgyu spits all the foam in his mouth into the sink. “What the _fuck_?”

“He was only pretending to like her to get her to come with him,” Soobin continues. He’s just stepped out of the shower, but now he’s too distracted to dry his hair, which is dripping all over the floor. “They were planning to hold her hostage for ransom, but the _Ritardando_ stopped them. According to captain Choi.”

“Well, that’s good.” Beomgyu frowns, plucking Soobin’s towel from his hands to dry his hair for him. “How’s your sister?”

“I don’t know. She didn’t want to talk to me.” Soobin sighs. Beomgyu takes the towel off his head to find Soobin sniffling.

“Oh, Soobin,” Beomgyu puts his arms around his boyfriend, resting his face on Soobin’s shoulder. “She’s going to be okay, at least she’s safe.”

Soobin nods, but he’s too choked up to say anything.

Beomgyu’s about to say something else when he realizes he’s smeared some toothpaste foam into Soobin’s collarbone. _Oops._

Soobin pouts at the streak of foam on his skin.

“Sorry, baby,” Beomgyu chuckles, taking the corner of Soobin’s towel to wipe it off. Then he frowns. “I’m sorry, wait. I just can’t imagine how the _Ritardando_ of all ships rescued your sister. Aren’t they shit-tier at best? Why would the General send someone like that to save one of his kids?”

“Oh, no, my dad had an agent tailing her, I think she just called the _Ritardando_ for backup.” Soobin says, hanging the towel from a peg on the bathroom wall. “He never trusted noona’s boyfriend to begin with, but he never thought it was _that_ bad.”

Beomgyu rinses his mouth out. He turns to Soobin with a smirk. “How many agents do you think are watching us right now?”

Soobin frowns. “There aren’t any. I made sure of it.”

“ _None_? For _you_?” Beomgyu scoffs. “Your dad’s probably got hundreds of agents just for you.”

Soobin hooks his finger in the waistband of Beomgyu’s slacks, pulling him closer. “Let me get this straight, you think _hundreds_ of people are watching us 24/7… and you aren’t even a little bit shy?”

“Don’t get my clothes wet.” Beomgyu wrinkles his nose, brushing Soobin’s damp hand away from his newly-pressed slacks. He glances at the mirror as he finishes buttoning his shirt up.

“Beomgyu, my love?”

“Yes?”

“If my dad ever offers you a position as an agent-”

“I’m gonna fucking take it.” Beomgyu says without a moment’s hesitation. “I’m pretty desperate for work right now.”

Soobin smiles, kissing Beomgyu briefly on the forehead. “Good luck on your interview, my love.”

Chaeryeong’s sister has to stop the car outside the next house, because three other cars are already parked outside Madam Kim’s house.

_Police cars._

Chaeryeong unclips her seatbelt and runs out.

“Chaeryeong, wait-”

“Let me through!” Chaeryeong says, pushing at the police officer blocking her way. “I’m a doctor! Madam Kim is my patient-”

“She’s not our concern.”

Chaeryeong frowns as two police officers come out of the house, leading Madam Kim’s son with his hands cuffed behind his back. “ _Seungmin_?”

He looks up at Chaeryeong with his eyes wide. “Dr. Lee, the books.”

“What?”

“The _books_.” Seungmin says tensely. “In the library. They’re rare editions.”

Chaeryeong frowns at him. “I, uh, yes, I’ll make sure they don’t touch them.”

The tension in Seungmin’s face eases up slightly. “Thank you, Doctor.”

He doesn’t fight against the officers as they lead him to the back of the police car. Chaeryeong doesn’t wait to see them drive off. She pushes past the police officer and runs into the house.

The living area is a mess. The tables and couch have been overturned, and the policemen are in the process of shaking the china out of every last display cabinet on the wall.

Chaeryeong doesn’t stop to fight them. She runs upstairs to Madam Kim’s room.

The elderly woman is laying face-down on the floor.

“Madam Kim!” Chaeryeong kneels next to her, turning her gently onto her side. “Madam Kim, it’s me, Dr. Lee, can you-”

Madam Kim gasps for air, before returning to sobbing silently as the crashes from below echo into the room. “The _animals_!”

Chaeryeong helps the woman up and into the nearest chair. She realizes she’d forgotten her med kit in the car, so she uses her fingers to take the old woman’s pulse. “What’s going on, Madam Kim? Why are they here?”

“They-!” Chaeryeong feels Madam Kim’s heart rate spike. “The _beasts_ accused my son of being a radical! _My_ son! A respected professor of the university! The _gall_ that-”

Madam Kim coughs, crumpling in her seat as she begins to sob again, punctuated by a particularly loud crash from downstairs.

The door to the bedroom swings open. Chaeryeong’s older sister’s standing there, med kit under one arm. “I’ll take it from here, Chaeryeong. I can’t stop them, maybe you can.”

“I’ll try.” Chaeryeong pats the elderly woman on the hand. “I’m going to fix things, Madam Kim, just take it easy. I’ll handle it.”

“Oh no, but those animals-”

“Chaeryeong’s got a black belt from the Academy, Madam Kim.” Chaeryeong’s older sister says with a confident grin. “They ought to be afraid of her.”

Chaeryeong scrunches her nose at her sister as she steps out into the hallway. The police have just climbed the stairs, and they’re now ramming the door to the library. _Absolutely not._

“Stop!” Chaeryeong stomps over and stands in the way of the battering ram. She glares at the policemen as if to say, _You just try me._ “Do you have a warrant to search this house?”

“The Professor’s a radical, ma’am, we’ve got to find all his-”

“Do you have a warrant?”

The policemen exchange glances. “We got orders from the chief, ma’am, we can’t just say no-”

“Leave this house immediately. If your chief asks why, tell him Dr. Lee Chaeryeong will not have anyone breaking the law on her watch, police officer or not.” Chaeryeong says. “He can find me at the Lee Family Clinic on General Soo Road.”

The police officers are sweating. “Ma’am-”

“I said what I said. Now get out.”

Yeonjun sighs. “As I said earlier, I need a shuttle to take me to the nearest ferry station, where I’ll take a ferry to Station 398.”

The small man chewing gum behind the counter frowns. “Why are you going to Station 398?”

“I work at Outpost 4417,” Yeonjun says slowly. “I am a Ranger Captain, and-”

“Ah, so sorry, sir, but this office only services _Descant_ -assigned Fleet officers.”

Yeonjun’s ready to tear his hair out. He knows that’s not true. He just _knows_ it. “I understand, but I came here on rather unusual circumstances, and I was hoping-”

“What kinda circumstances?”

“I had a meeting with the General.” Yeonjun says.

“The _General_! A _ranger_ is here to meet the fucking _General?_ Best shit I heard all year!” The man behind the counter starts laughing. Then he gags and begins choking, scratching the counter between them as he tries to gasp for around the gum lodged in his throat.

Yeonjun scowls at the choking man for a moment. _I could leave him to choke._

Then he sighs and leaps over the counter, putting his arms around the man to Heimlich the gum out.

Chaeryeong waits for her sister to close the bedroom door behind her. “How is she?”

“Shaken, but she’s calmed down a bit.”

“Can I speak to her?”

Chaeryeong’s sister frowns. “Were you able to get rid of all the policemen? How?”

“I said some shit, I don’t know.” Chaeryeong sighs. “But they’d already made a mess of downstairs.”

“Fuck them.”

“Can I speak to Madam Kim?”

“Don’t mention the mess downstairs.”

“Of course not.” Chaeryeong says. Her sister steps aside, letting her into the elderly woman’s room. “Madam Kim?”

Madam Kim is lying in her large, four-postered maple wood bed, leaning against the pillows. Her eyes are half-open as she turns slowly to Chaeryeong. “Ah, Doctor Beautiful.”

Chaeryeong tries not to grimace. It’s so very like her sister to rely on sedatives. “Madam Kim, do you have a key to the library? There was a book I meant to return and-”

“Of course.” The elderly woman holds one trembling hand out to Chaeryeong.

Chaeryeong frowns. “Madam Kim, I was asking for a key-”

“The green one. Green was my husband’s favorite color.”

Chaeryeong looks down at Madam Kim’s hand, with one or two large rings on each finger. Sure enough, there’s a ring with a tiny green stone on her pinky finger.

Chaeryeong gently slides it off. “Thank you, Madam Kim. You should rest. Unnie and I will stay with you, don’t worry.”

The elderly woman smiles after a second, then shuts her eyes.

Chaeryeong slips out of the room silently.

“What did she say?”

“Nothing.” Chaeryeong walks across the hall to the library door, which had suffered a huge dent from the police’s battering earlier.

“What are you doing?”

Chaeryeong holds the ring up to the door.

It slides open.

Chaeryeong had never been in the library, but none of the other doors in the house slid like this.

“What the hell.” Chaeryeong’s sister says, frowning at the gap in the wall that the door has disappeared into.

Chaeryeong steps into the library, which has one hardwood table with four chairs around it, a lounge chair by the window, and shelves lining every wall but the outer wall facing the street.

She walks along the shelves, looking at the books. They all look like old, dusty actual-paper books that haven’t been touched in years, probably rare editions like Seungmin had said. _He would know, he’s a History professor._

Chaeryeong does another round around the room, studying the shelves. The books seem to be arranged alphabetically and all written in Earth dialect, which she finds weird. All of the history books her professors ever used, even in her university on Earth, were written in Moon.

_What are you expecting to find?_

She finds a glossy bird carved into the side of the bookshelf. She holds it briefly. It’s not dusty like the rest of the library.

She feels all round it, but nothing happens. _Perhaps it’s just polished regularly, like Madam Kim’s rings…_

Chaeryeong lifts the tiny ring with its green stone to the side of the shelf.

It slides open, revealing a tight space, only wide enough for one person to fit into.

“Chaeryeong, what the hell-”

Chaeryeong steps into the space.

There’s a darkened, old-looking computer terminal at the end of the narrow, short space. Chaeryeong taps the ring to the surface of the screen.

It blinks to life, a simple black screen with white text.

> _Outgoing Transmission 383 – 2224/05/21 [CC]_
> 
> _This is Wolf-2._
> 
> _A new blight is spreading._
> 
> _Many have nothing to eat._
> 
> _What should I do?_
> 
> _Outgoing Transmission 384 – 2224/05/22 [CC]_
> 
> _This is Wolf-2._
> 
> _A new blight is spreading._
> 
> _Many have nothing to eat._
> 
> _What should I do?_
> 
> _Outgoing Transmission 385 – 2224/05/23 [CC]_
> 
> _This is Wolf-2._
> 
> _A new blight is spreading._
> 
> _Many have nothing to eat._
> 
> _What should I do?_

Chaeryeong frowns at the transmission’s date. _That was when I was last here._

But the transmission log doesn’t end there. It keeps going for weeks until just the day before, with the same message.

Chaeryeong closes her eyes.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ⨁ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

_“A new blight is spreading.”_

She hears it in Seungmin’s voice, that even, steady voice that lulls all his students to sleep whether he likes it or not.

_“Many have nothing to eat.”_

But the image of Seungmin fades away.

_“What should I do?”_

The words tumble out of Yang Jeongin’s mouth, though the voice isn’t his own. It’s still Kim Seungmin’s.

“ _Send transmission.”_

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ⨁ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Chaeryeong gasps.

“Chaeryeong! Get out of there, what the hell is that!” Chaeryeong’s sister drags her out of the cramped space. The panel at the side of the bookshelf slides back into place.

Chaeryeong looks at her empty palm. _No. The ring. It’s still in there._

“Wait, I left something inside,” Chaeryeong says, scratching at the side of the bookshelf.

“No.” Chaeryeong’s sister drags her away and towards the door. “This place is weird. We are leaving.”

Chaeryeong watches as the door to the library slides shut after them. “Unnie…”

“What?”

“I think the police were right.”

Chaeryeong’s sister frowns. “How hard did you hit your head in there?”

Chaeryeong shakes her head. “Seungmin _is_ one of them.”


	23. The Assembly of Rangers That Fight

“Seokcheol!” A voice echoes from down the hallway. The outpost’s walls are lightweight enough for Ranger Soon’s voice to enter the room before he does. “SEOKCHEOL!”

The thin door to the outpost’s sleeping quarters slides open, flooding the room with the sharp white light from the hallway.

“SEOKCHEOL, THE DIRECTOR’S GOT-”

“Shut up, you idiot!” Ranger Kang hisses from where he’s sitting up in one of the lower bunks. He points at the bunk opposite him, where Yeonjun’s turned towards the wall. “Captain Choi’s sleeping.”

“Oh. He’s back?”

“He literally just got back from hitchhiking from the _Descant_ base.”

“Hitchhiking? The _Descant?_ The fuck was he doing there!?”

“He had to go there to debrief or something and they didn’t give him a lift back or money or anything!”

“Those fuckers on the base really think they’re hot shit, don’t they?”

“No, they just think _we’re_ regular shit.”

Yeonjun rolls over, fixing the two younger rangers with an annoyed look. He’s lost enough weight over the past couple weeks for the circles under his eyes to be both dark and hollow, like the holes in a skull.

“Oh, sorry, Captain Choi.” Ranger Kang says, lowering his voice back to a respectful whisper. “It’s Ranger Soon’s fault, he-!”

“ _My_ fault? You’re the one who was yelling-!”

“Does the Director have our new assignments already?” Yeonjun asks.

Ranger Soon lowers his head in a way that looks almost bashful. It’s a weird look on him, to say the least. “Yes, Captain.”

“Good day, Rangers,” The outpost director smiles at the rangers seated around her office. The outpost didn’t have a meeting room, and the mess hall just wasn’t formal enough. “It’s good to see us all complete again and in good health.”

Ranger Captain Jeon frowns at her with the sunken eyes of a newly-minted father. “Good to see you too, Director.”

The director’s smile wanes a little as she looks over Yeonjun, who’s been staring unblinkingly at nothing in particular for the past ten minutes. “Let’s get started, then. I have been granted early retirement, and as direct result, Ranger Captain Jeon is promoted to director of this outpost for the next five years.”

The ranger captain’s face falls.

“I’m sorry.” The director says. “I’m afraid your transfer request was rejected.”

Ranger Captain Jeon nods. “It’s fine, ma’am. Congratulations on your retirement.”

“Thank you.” The director squints at the tiny display on her tablet. “Rangers, these are your new assignments: Ranger Yoon, outpost 4286; Ranger Soon, outpost 4157; Ranger Lee Young-ae, outpost 3976; Ranger Lee Youngjae, 4111; and Ranger Kang, outpost 4372.”

“Congratulations on getting into the 3k outposts,” Ranger Yoon says to Ranger Lee Young-ae, who sighs.

“Yeah, barely.”

“It’s still less than a week to get back to the Moon from there.” Ranger Kang sighs.

“At least we’re out of _here_.” Ranger Soon says with an easy grin.

Yeonjun sighs.

“Director,” Ranger Captain Jeon says. “You missed out on Ranger Captain Choi.”

“Oh dear,” The director scrolls up and down her tablet screen. “Oh dear.”

Yeonjun knows what she’s about to say next.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Ranger Captain Im, outpost 4127; Ranger Seo, outpost 4406; Ranger Jang, outpost 4017; Ranger Jeong, outpost 4234; Ranger Go, outpost 4413; and finally, Ranger Bang, outpost 4387.” The outpost director said, picking at his dirty fingernails as he peered down at the tablet resting on his desk. “Any questions?”

Ranger Captain Im raised her hand.

“Yes, Ranger Captain Im?”

“Director, I believe you forgot to read Yeonjun’s new assignment,” The ranger captain said, shooting a friendly smile in Yeonjun’s direction.

Yeonjun smiled back.

“Hm.” The outpost director scrolled up and down his tablet screen. “No, I didn’t.”

The ranger captain’s smile faded. “B- But that’s not possible, Director, all of us are supposed to be reshuffled-”

“I know how the Reshuffling works.” The outpost director said testily.

“And you signed Yeonjun’s application for a promotion-”

“I know I did, now just let me read, woman!” The outpost director grumbled, tapping his tablet so hard that Yeonjun was afraid his long nails would crack it. “There’s nothing here!”

“But what does that mean, sir?”

“That Ranger Choi will be staying here at outpost 4417.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Perhaps the message got cut off-”

“No, there’s no way,” the outpost director shakes her head. “I’ve done this hundreds of times, Ranger Captain Jeon, all official documents end with the Fleet insignia and there it is-”

“But all of us are supposed to get new assignments-”

“Yes, I know how the Reshuffling works, you don’t need to remind me-”

“It’s all right.” Yeonjun says, standing up. Everyone in the room frowns at him, a cocktail of confused and concerned for him. _Because they’ve never seen this kind of bullshit before._ “If my name’s not on the list, then I’m going to continue working at this outpost. That’s what happened last time.”

The director purses her lips. “That can’t be, Yeonjun, you’ve been working at the same assignment for six years now.”

“Seven.” Yeonjun says.

“Sorry.” The director sighs. “ _Seven_ years.”

“Didn’t Captain Choi just… you know… save hundreds of lives?” Ranger Kang asks, frowning.

Yeonjun keeps his mouth shut and eyes trained on the floor. He’s not about to tell everyone in the outpost that he’d been rude to the General and will likely be working at this same, literal dead end of an outpost until they offer him retirement some three decades from now. They talk about him enough as it is.

“I’m telling you, the people back on that base ain’t shit.” Ranger Soon mutters, ignoring the sharp look he gets from the outpost director and Ranger Captain Jeon.

The ranger captain claps Yeonjun gently on the back. “Well, anyhow, we’re in this together, aren’t we, Captain Choi?”

Yeonjun nods.

“Director, you have a new message,” Ranger Yoon says, pointing at the blinking blue light at the director’s transmission station.

“Maybe they had a correction.” Ranger Lee Young-ae says, glancing in Yeonjun’s direction.

The director rolls her chair over to her transmission station, typing in her passcode so slowly that everyone in the room could easily copy it. As it is, everyone in the room has seen it, many times. But none of them have ever even tried hacking into the director’s terminal, for fear of falling further down the ranks, whatever that may mean for someone assigned to the furthest outpost.

Yeonjun sighs _. I should’ve just accepted the General’s offer. Why am I so stupid?_

“Ah, yes, it is about Ranger Captain Choi,” The director says. All the other rangers release a sigh of relief, save for Yeonjun, who hasn’t let his guard down.

_Maybe what I did is worth being court-marshaled over._

“It says here that,” The outpost director peers at the small text on her holo-screen. “As of today, Ranger Captain Choi Yeonjun is to report to the ARTF Unit.”

“The _what_ now?” Ranger Soon makes a face.

“I’ve never heard of it.” The outpost director sighs. “Have you, Ranger Captain Choi?”

Yeonjun stops trying to think of what unit could possibly be lower than outpost 4417 for a brief moment. “No, ma’am.”

“Assembly of Rangers That…” Ranger Yoon frowns. “…Fight?”

“Automatic… Rifle… Training… Force?” Ranger Lee Youngjae offers.

“Aaaahhhhh…” Ranger Kang goes on, having trouble thinking of a word that starts with the letter ‘A’.

“Surely the message lists his direct commanding officer,” Ranger Captain Jeon says.

The director turns back to squint at her screen. “Admiral Kim Taehyung.”

Yeonjun blinks. “Of the _Descant_?”

“Isn’t he like, the highest-ranking officer in the whole fucking Fleet?” Ranger Soon asks, before choking on his own spit.

“That’s the General, you idiot.” Ranger Kang rolls his eyes.

“You’re both idiots. The Admiral’s right below the General.” Ranger Lee Young-ae says curtly.

Ranger Captain Jeon shoots stern looks at the other rangers until they settle back into silence. “Director Yoo, can you please confirm?”

“Uh…” The director scrolls up and down the message but there’s nowhere else for her to go. “Yes, I read it right. Captain Choi Yeonjun is to report immediately to the _EFB Descant._ This ARTF unit seems to be directly under the command of the Admiral of the Fleet.”

The entire room erupts in cheers.

Yeonjun leans his forehead against the glass of the ferry window. He knows it’s disgusting, but he suspects he might be too hungover or still drunk to care.

_It’s Ranger Yoon’s fault._ Yeonjun shuts his eyes, feeling some of the warmth from his forehead drain into the cool glass. He hadn’t known that Ranger Yoon’s family ran a distillery, and that the ranger’s care packages from home were hiding liter after liter of hard liquor. _Well I found out last night_. _The hard way._

Yeonjun tries to recall what had happened, but he can barely even remember how he got to the ferry in the first place. _Did I take a cruiser?_

_No, someone had to have given me a lift here. I was too drunk to drive._

_But wasn’t everyone else in the outpost drunk?_

The space behind Yeonjun’s eyes aches.

_If I didn’t drive myself to the ferry station then who-_

He has a sudden, vague recollection of himself dancing on a table.

_Oh god._

Yeonjun shakes his head. _No more remembering. Remembering is bad._

Yeonjun jolts awake.

“Sir, please exit the ferry. The ferry has to leave in a few minutes.”

Yeonjun’s head is pounding as he drags himself out of his seat. _Still? It’s been_ days _._

Everyone else in the cabin – all four hundred of them – is gone. _Shit._

He uses the headrests and backrests as a crutch to pull himself out into the aisle.

Then he realizes something’s wrong.

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to leave _now_ -”

Yeonjun pats himself down, a frown groggily crossing his face. _Fuck._

“My credit fob’s been stolen.” Yeonjun mutters.

“I’m sorry about that, but you really have to go.”

Yeonjun shuts his eyes. The noise and crowd in the Moon Grand Central is headache-inducing as it is, but it’s just awful in Yeonjun’s current state.

_I need electrolytes._ Yeonjun lets the crowd push him along until he finds a vending machine.

He pushes the button on the least sweet electrolyte drink available, twice. He’s going to need it.

The cost comes up on the holoscreen. _Tap credit fob to pay ^w^_ , a message below the cost reads.

Yeonjun reaches into his pocket.

“Shit.” Yeonjun grumbles, resting his forehead against the glass of the vending machine. “Shit. Shit. Motherfucking. Shit.”

“Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun doesn’t turn around at first, because he’s sure his mental, emotional, and physical state is just making him hear things.

“Choi Yeonjun?”

_If it happened again, then it’s real, right?_

_Or I’m just on the brink of death. That’s likely._

He turns around. “Hi, Chaeryeong.”

Chaeryeong smiles. There are a few more lines wrapping around her smile than before, but it’s just the same as Yeonjun remembers.

“Oh, go ahead,” Chaeryeong laughs, gesturing at the vending machine. She leans back against a big, battered suitcase she’s got with her. “I’ll wait my turn.”

Yeonjun doesn’t even look back at the damn machine. “Uh, about that… My uh…” He shuts his eyes, his hears heating up in embarrassment. “My credit fob got stolen on the way here.”

“Oh, crap, okay.” Chaeryeong shrugs, reaching into her purse to pull out a worn blue credit fob. “Here.”

“Thanks.” Yeonjun cracks the first electrolyte drink open and drains it as soon as it touched his lips. He hands the credit fob back to Chaeryeong before he opens the second drink.

Yeonjun flinches slightly when Chaeryeong pokes his face.

“You’re dehydrated.” Chaeryeong says. “ _Very_ dehydrated.”

“I know.” Yeonjun leans out of Chaeryeong’s grasp to drain the second drink.

“Those aren’t going to help,” Chaeryeong’s frowning at Yeonjun’s face. “You look like a raccoon. You need an IV.”

“Chaeryeong, it’s nice to see you again, but if I wanted my grandmother, I’d have gone home.” Yeonjun mutters, rubbing his eyes. He can _feel_ how sunken they are. He can only imagine what Chaeryeong’s seeing. Then he frowns at her. “I thought you were going to stay on Earth.”

“I did, for the past couple of years.” Chaeryeong’s lips purse in a weird way. “But I just signed up for the Fleet.”

Yeonjun frowns at her. He’s not exactly capable of constructing sentences right now.

“I guess you just got Reshuffled.” Chaeryeong says. “Where’d you get assigned to?”

Yeonjun manages to say, “The ARTF.”

Chaeryeong stares at him. “What?”

“I don’t know what it is either-”

“I was assigned there, too.” Chaeryeong says softly. “What are the odds?”

Yeonjun tries to imagine what sort of unit would need a doctor who with no field experience and a ranger from the outermost outpost of the Fleet. _It can’t be a good one._

_But why would we answer directly to the Admiral?_

Something about the entire situation doesn’t sit well with Yeonjun.

_No._ Yeonjun clutches his stomach. _That’s the electrolyte drink._

“Yeonjun?” Chaeryeong asks, one hand resting carefully on Yeonjun’s arm.

Yeonjun bends over and throws up right onto the polished concrete floor of the Moon Grand Central.

“Fuck this shit, I’m taking you to a hospital whether you like it or not.”

Yeonjun straightens up. He has the decency and presence of mind to wipe his mouth off on his sleeve before arguing with Chaeryeong again, but he never gets around to doing that. Because his vision darkens, and he hits the floor with a thankfully dry thud.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun is floating.

He thinks for a second that the artificial gravity might have crashed. Then he remembers that he’s on the Moon. Something has to have gone _terribly_ wrong for the Moon’s artificial gravity generator and all its’ backups to have failed.

Yeonjun feels his chest tighten in anxiety.

Then a stream of bubbles escapes from his nose and mouth.

Yeonjun paddles with his arms, searching for the surface of whatever body of water he’s in.

He breaks the surface, taking in whatever air he finds in huge gulps. The air is crisp but has this dry, strangely clinical flavor to it.

“Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun finds something up ahead: a wooden pier jutting out into the water. Someone’s standing on the pier, but Yeonjun tries not to give them a second thought or glance as he swims towards the pier.

Yeonjun grabs ahold of the top of the pier, lifting himself up onto it.

“What happened? Are you okay?” Soobin asks, resting one hand on Yeonjun’s back.

Yeonjun coughs up the last of the water he’d swallowed, crouched on all fours. “I’m fine.”

Soobin rubs Yeonjun’s back. “Who told you to jump into the lake fully dressed?”

Yeonjun scrambles away from him. Soobin frowns. He looks just as he did the last time Yeonjun had seen him, at graduation. But he’s wearing this loose off-white sweater and linen shorts that Yeonjun had never seen before. And they’re sitting on a pier beside some lake reflecting a nearby mountain. The peak is so far off that it fades into mist, and Yeonjun can’t tell where the dome up above begins, if there is one.

“What’re you looking at?” Soobin asks, following Yeonjun’s line of sight.

Yeonjun studies Soobin’s face again. There’s no way he still looks this young after seven years.

“Am I dead?” Yeonjun asks out loud.

“Uh…” Soobin laughs, resting a hand on Yeonjun’s chest. “No, I don’t think so.”

Yeonjun jerks away, frowning. “I don’t think Beomgyu would like it if you did that.”

“What?” Soobin’s eyes twinkle in amusement. “ _Beomgyu_?”

“Your boyfriend, Beomgyu.” Yeonjun stands up, feeling his wet clothes weigh him down. The gravity here is stronger than it is on the Moon. It’s strangely strong for artificial gravity.

_I must be on Earth, then._ Yeonjun whirls around frantically. They seem to be standing on an island covered in short grass and neatly arranged pine trees, with the water stretching all around in every direction. _Where on Earth_ is _this_?

“Did you hit your head or something?” Soobin ruffles Yeonjun’s dripping hair.

Yeonjun backs away from him, feeling his heels graze the edge of the pier. Soobin reaches out to catch him, but Yeonjun brushes his hands away.

Soobin sighs, turning to start walking up the pier. “Dump your clothes by the door. Do you want me to run you a bath?”

Yeonjun stays frozen to the spot. “What?”

“I said,” Soobin sighs, raising his voice. “Don’t bring your wet clothes into the house.”

“House?”

Soobin turns to Yeonjun with an exasperated look. “Yes, Yeonjun, the _house_. The one over there? Remember it?” He throws his entire arm out to point at a low, single-storey cabin sitting atop a nearby slope.

Yeonjun only looks at the house now. It seems to be built of pine, with two broad windows looking out over them and the lake beyond. He has never seen it before in his entire life.

“ _Our_ house?” Yeonjun asks numbly.

Soobin lets out a groan. “Yes, Yeonjun, _our_ house that we live in. Got any more stupid questions for me?”

Yeonjun stumbles up the pier, looking at the cabin all the while. A breeze rustles through the trees, shaking up the little pink flowers dotting the hillside. “Why do we live together?”

“Honestly you’re making me ask myself the same question.” Soobin laughs, taking Yeonjun by the hand as the latter steps onto the dirt path.

Yeonjun frowns down at their hands as Soobin twines their fingers together. He knows that he ought to let go, he owes Beomgyu that much, but the feeling of someone holding him for a reason other than happenstance… Yeonjun hasn’t felt it in a long time.

He looks up at Soobin, whose mouth is still curled into a little smile left over from the joke he’d made a whole minute before.

Yeonjun smiles up at him. He hasn’t felt this calm in his entire life.

Soobin’s expression changes suddenly. His brows furrow, just as the wind whips into their faces. The sparkle in his eyes turns frantic. “What’s that?”

Yeonjun feels Soobin’s grip tighten on his hand as the latter looks up the mountain, frowning.

The world around them suddenly grows darker, as if the strip lights above had been shut off.

Yeonjun looks up to find, instead of the mist wrapping the peak of the mountain, nothing but darkness. The vast, dimensionless void seems to crawl across the sky, consuming everything in its path. There’s something familiar about it that Yeonjun can’t quite place.

Soobin clutches Yeonjun’s arm. “Yeonjun, let get into the house-”

“There’s no point.” Yeonjun finds himself saying. He’s realized where he’s seen it before.

Soobin’s hands tremble. “But-”

Yeonjun sighs. He lifts a hand to Soobin’s face. _Why does it have to feel so real?_

Tears collect on Soobin’s lower lashes. It makes Yeonjun’s chest ache in a way that it hasn’t in years.

“I’m sorry, Beomgyu.” Yeonjun says.

“What?”

Yeonjun pulls Soobin in for a kiss. He closes his eyes, feeling the softness of Soobin’s lips against his own for a brief second. Then all the warmth from Soobin’s body, the damp from Yeonjun’s clothes, the chill from the breeze – everything fades away so quickly it’s as if they had never been there.

Yeonjun goes back to feeling what he has for the past couple of years: Nothing.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun jolts awake like he’d fallen into his bed. He vaguely hears hysterical beeping coming from somewhere, but he ignores it.

He reaches up and touches his lips. They’re still numb.

Yeonjun sinks into his pillow. There’s a part of him he’s brushed aside, like paperwork he doesn’t want to finish. It’s a very small part of him, and he thought he could just ignore it, because it’s so stupid to even think of things like that when there are always more pressing matters.

It’s the part of him that just wants to be held.

“Yeonjun?” Chaeryeong asks, sitting up in a nearby bay window seat. Her breathing seems ragged, like she’d just stopped running.

Yeonjun looks around. He seems to be in a hospital ward, but the eleven other beds in the room are empty.

The beeping slows down to a steady, slow pace. Yeonjun realizes it was a heart monitor hooked up to him.

Chaeryeong climbs down from the bay window, rubbing her eyes as she walks over. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m fine.” Yeonjun says. He tries sliding out of bed, but he’s stopped by an uncomfortable tug in his right arm. He looks down to find a clear tube disappearing in a small hole in his arm.

“Don’t pull that out, I don’t wanna have to put it back in.” Chaeryeong says, gently easing Yeonjun back onto the bed.

“Still queasy about blood?”

“No, of course not.” Chaeryeong laughs. “Doing a C-section really knocks that out of you.”

Yeonjun makes a face. He doesn’t even want to imagine what that’s like.

“I just don’t wanna add more items to the bill,” Chaeryeong says, flicking him right at the point where the IV drip entered his arm. Yeonjun winces with pain.

“Ow, Chaeryeong, why would you-”

“How could you let your badge get stolen?” Chaeryeong snaps at him, folding her arms. “You know these goddamned Moon hospitals won’t let you in unless you can prove you have State insurance?”

Yeonjun groans inwardly, remembering his credit fob and badge, probably tumbling from one hand to another in the black market by now. He covers his face in shame. “Am I using your insurance?”

“No, I don’t have any.” Chaeryeong says. She only rolls her eyes when Yeonjun gives her a concerned look. “The only people in my dome with insurance are the ones whose family work for the Fleet.”

“Oh.” Yeonjun frowns at her, lifting his arm with the IV drip. “How are we going to pay for this, then?”

Chaeryeong sits at the edge of Yeonjun’s bed. “We can worry about that later. How are you feeling?”

“I told you. I’m fine.”

Chaeryeong fixes him with a suspicious look. “Your heart rate doesn’t spike like that for no reason.”

Yeonjun chooses his words carefully. “I had a… _strange_ dream.”

The shift in Chaeryeong’s expression is so abrupt it worries Yeonjun.

“It’s happened to you, too?” Chaeryeong asks slowly. She seems to be looking at something beyond Yeonjun, thought he knows there’s nothing behind him but the wall. “The darkness?”

Yeonjun sits up, ignoring the tug of his IV against his arm. His mouth has gone dry. _What does she know about it?_

The door to the ward slides open. A nurse in a rose-colored uniform comes in holding a holo-screen. He stops beside Yeonjun’s bed.

“Mr. Choi, glad to see you’re doing better.” He says without an ounce of emotion in his voice. “The doctor has decided you’re ready to be discharged-”

“What doctor?” Chaeryeong asks. “No one’s been here to see him.”

The nurse looks up from his aqua holo-screen then. His face is just as blank as his voice as he says, “I’m sorry to hear that. Would you like for me to call in one of our doctors on duty?”

“Will it incur more costs?” Yeonjun asks.

“Yes, I’m afraid so.” The nurse sounds as though he’s never been afraid of a thing in his life.

“Never mind, then, I’m a doctor,” Chaeryeong waves a hand over Yeonjun like she’s casting a spell. “Yeah, he seems okay.”

“That’s good to hear,” The nurse drones on, looking back at his holo-screen. It becomes evident that he’s reading off it. “Please settle your bill at the Cashier on the 3rd floor, only after which you will be allowed to leave the hospital.”

Yeonjun frowns. _There’s something wrong with his script’s grammar. But what?_

“Is there anything else I may assist you with?” The nurse asks.

“Uh,” Chaeryeong says. “Would you happen to know how much the bill is?”

“Of course,” The nurse types into his holo-screen. He turns it to face them, their bill displayed in the biggest possible font.

Chaeryeong and Yeonjun choke on the stale hospital room air. 

“F- For a f- few hours and _one_ IV d- drip?” Chaeryeong stammers.

“Well, it would depend what type of insurance you have.”

“I’m with the Fleet.” Yeonjun says. “Ranger Captain of Outpost 4417.”

The nurse blinks, so unimpressed it physically hurts Yeonjun a little bit. “Badge, please.”

Yeonjun blushes. “My credit fob got stolen-”

“Without proof of insurance, I’m afraid you will not be eligible for the 80% discount.” The nurse says.

“That’s _already_ discounted?” Chaeryeong squawks, pointing at the screen.

“Yes.”

She looks at Yeonjun, mouthing silent curses.

“Um, Nurse… Sorry, I didn’t quite catch your name?” Chaeryeong asks in a sickeningly sweet voice.

“I didn’t give it.”

“Could we have a minute alone, please?”

Yeonjun frowns at Chaeryeong. _What is she thinking?_

“I can’t believe we’re doing this.” Yeonjun pants, running a few strides behind Chaeryeong. He hadn’t been able to claim his clothes, so he’s sprinting down the sidewalk of the broad Moon avenue in his hospital gown and slippers.

“Keep holding the tissue to your arm!” Chaeryeong yells between gasps for air.

Yeonjun drops a slipper, but he doesn’t have time to even think of it. He presses down on the tissue he’s holding to his right forearm, where Chaeryeong had yanked his IV out of just a few moments before.

“We’re going to get arrested!” Yeonjun hisses at her as they weave through the confused crowd milling about the avenue’s sidewalk. He doesn’t know his way around this part of Sector 3, so he’s hoping, against all logic, that Chaeryeong does.

“No we’re _not_!” Chaeryeong shrieks, turning a corner last minute with all the confidence of someone who definitely has no idea where they’re going.

Sirens begin to blare some distance behind them.

“Fuck!” Chaeryeong skids to a halt. She’s led them into a side street that ends in a membership-exclusive toy store. “FUCK!”

Yeonjun doesn’t need to turn around. He stumbles to a stop, seeing the red and blue light of the police siren bouncing into the side street from behind him. _Why did I agree to this?_

_I_ just _got out of Outpost 4417…_

“Ranger Choi Yeonjun and Doctor Lee Chaeryeong, you are under arrest for theft of State hospital property and failure to settle hospital bills. Put your hands above your head and face the wall.”

Yeonjun sighs and turns to the dirty concrete wall, arms raised above his head. He hears Chaeryeong’s boots crunch in the gravel next to him as she lifts her own hands.

He’s never been on this end of an arrest before. _It sucks._

“You have the right to remain silent.” One of the officers says, clasping a set of cuffs around Yeonjun’s wrists. Yeonjun silently mouths his rights along with the officer. “Anything you say can and will be used against you.”

“Sorry, Officers, but they’re coming with me.”

Both Yeonjun and Chaeryeong turn around, knowing full well that doing so gives the police the authority to stun them.

Instructor Jung’s standing at the mouth of the side street. He gives them a broad smile and a wave.

The officer who’d just cuffed Chaeryeong frowns. “Sir, please don’t attempt to interfere-”

“Sorry, forgot to introduce myself. I’m Major Jung of the _EFB Descant_ ,” The instructor – _No, he’s a Major now,_ Yeonjun corrects himself internally as he sees the badge the older man is holding up. Sure enough, it _does_ seem like Instructor Jung’s been promoted a ton of times since he saw him last.

The police officers let go of Yeonjun and Chaeryeong to put together frantic salutes. “Sorry, Major.”

“It’s all right,” Major Jung gives them a sympathetic smile. “I just, uh, I’ve got to bring these two to the base. The Admiral was expecting them four days ago.”

Yeonjun’s face reddens.

“Sorry, Major.” He and Chaeryeong mumble.

Major Jung looks over them both, Chaeryeong in her heavy traveler’s clothes and Yeonjun in his hospital gown and one slipper. Then he lets out a big sigh. “I’ve got fresh clothes on the ship, don’t worry.”

“Good morning to all,” Major Jung says, sliding the door to the meeting room open. They’re on the 2301st floor of the _Descant_ , in one of the inner wings with a glass wall running along one side, giving them a view of nothing but mist from the top of the teraship’s peak. The major motions for Chaeryeong and Yeonjun to enter ahead of him. “I’m sorry again for keeping you waiting-”

“For only six days and twenty-two hours and… Nineteen minutes.”

Yeonjun and Chaeryeong stop in the doorway, exchanging confused glances.

The meeting room itself looks nothing like an ordinary meeting room. The room itself has the usual ovoid shape of a meeting room, but the floors seem to be made of polished marble, and the chairs are all plush white leather. The table at the center is glass streaked with dark gray fog, and the legs seem to be coated in gold, like the chandelier erupting from the domed ceiling above. The entire room is grand enough to confuse Yeonjun, but he doesn’t even mind any of it right now, because he recognizes the three people who’d been waiting in the room.

A man sitting in one of the chairs, hands folded in his lap and face folded in a frown. His deep aubergine uniform looks like it had been pressed just a few seconds ago. He looks down at his holo-watch, a somber gray unit.

“Make that twenty minutes.” Kang Taehyun corrects himself, closing his holo-watch’s display.

“Chaeryeong? Yeonjun?” A woman had been sprawled gracelessly across one of the chairs. She quickly straightens up to grin at them, pulling her crumpled navy uniform to cover her stomach. Her hair is much, much shorter than it was when Yeonjun saw her last, and one of her canines has been chipped beyond repair, but there’s no mistaking it: It’s Shin Ryujin.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Beomgyu’s wearing an awkwardly tight fatigue engineer’s uniform that he clearly hasn’t worn in a long time. He stands up, running a hand agitatedly through his hair. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

_Why would the five of us… why would they bring the five of us together?_

_…After all this time?_

“Please take your seats,” Major Jung says, making a lame gesture at the empty chairs, of which there are eight. He clasps his hands together, looking over the five of them like a preschool teacher, or perhaps a cattle herder. “All right, how many are we?”

Yeonjun frowns at him. “What’s going on, Major?”

Major Jung just gestures to one of the empty seats again. “Where are the others?”

“Others?” Chaeryeong stops in the middle of receiving a hug from Beomgyu.

Major Jung turns to the door just as it slides open.

“Good morning, Major.”

Yeonjun hasn’t seen him in seven years, but there’s just nothing you could do to Kim Soobin that would prevent Yeonjun from recognizing him.

Yeonjun swallows, feeling his throat closing up.

“I was just touring the others around the quarters,” Soobin says. He steps aside to usher more people into the room.

Beomgyu narrows his eyes. “Soobin?”

Soobin ignores him, choosing instead to gaze at Yeonjun with a look that appears to be lost between curious and apologetic. “Hello, Yeonjun.”

Ryujin rises to her feet, because a woman in a gray captain’s uniform has just entered the room. “Yeji?”

Hwang Yeji pauses midstep, frowning first at Ryujin then at the major, mouth open at a loss for words.

The person behind Yeji knocks into her. It’s Shin Yuna, wearing a fatigue uniform with only slightly better tailoring than Beomgyu’s. “What the hell is going on?”

Yeonjun realizes that Choi Lia and Jung Kai are also standing at the door, in the deep aubergine and maroon uniforms of a Fleet navigator and medical officer, respectively. Lia’s hair has grown past her waist, while Kai’s shoulder-length hair seems to be slowly, but steadily catching up.

Major Jung raises both hands, as if in surrender, before anyone’s able to even begin to say anything else. “All of you stay put and get to know each other-”

“We already do, Major.” Beomgyu says tensely, glaring in Soobin’s direction. “What the hell is going on?”

The major clears his throat, nodding placidly. “I’ll go get the Admiral.”

He shuts the door after him, leaving nothing but painful silence behind.

Yeonjun staggers back into the nearest chair, watching the others stumble into their own seats as if they’re drunk. His heart is hammering in his chest, each individual beat echoing in his ears. The examiner at his last psych evaluation had told him that he wasn’t likely to have violent attacks, if he would just avoid anything that might remind him of his experiences.

“Remaining at outpost 4417 is ideal,” The examiner had said. “If for that reason alone.”

_How do I avoid remembering now?_ Yeonjun thinks helplessly, feeling his breaths get shallower and shallower as he pointedly avoids the gaze of everyone at the table. Especially Kim Soobin, who hasn’t looked away from Yeonjun since he’d arrived.

Yeonjun doesn’t need to look. He knows Soobin’s eyes still hold the stars in them as they study him with that strange, sad expression.

Just when Yeonjun feels like he’s run out of air, the door slides open again. A tall, middle-aged man in a crisp white Fleet uniform enters. Five gold moons are embroidered on his breast pocket in lieu of his name. But even if he hadn’t been wearing the uniform, they would’ve known who he was anyway. His gaze is cold enough to rend flesh.

Yeonjun and the others jump to their feet as if on strings, saluting numbly.

“Please, take your seats,” The Admiral says, giving them a curt salute in reply. “Thank you for handling things, Major Jung and Lieutenant Kim.”

Beomgyu straightens up in his seat, frowning deeply in Soobin’s direction.

The Admiral takes a seat at the head of the table. “I’m most pleased to know that you haven’t died on the way here, Ranger Captain Choi.”

Yeonjun lowers his head. He still can’t breathe well, and his heart is racing so quickly it seems well on its way to failure, so he feels that the Admiral’s spoken too soon.

Everyone around the table shifts around awkwardly when they hear Yeonjun’s title. Yeonjun’s not feeling so faint that he doesn’t notice.

“I don’t have a lot of time to waste, so if there are any of you who think it’s beneath you to work with a ranger captain, please leave the room now.” The Admiral says, folding his hands together. He props his chin on top of them as he studies each of the others’ nervous faces. “No one? Good.”

Yeonjun still feels as though he could pass out (or away) at any moment, but he can’t help but smile a little bit. He likes the Admiral already.

“Welcome to the Anti-Radical Task Force.” The Admiral says. “This unit conducts recon on the radicals to find out where they are and how we can be rid of them once and for all.”

Chaeryeong hands curl into fists under the table.

Taehyun raises his hand.

“Yes, Mr. Kang?”

“With all due respect, sir, I’ve been working in the Intelligence Department for the past five years, and I would just like to know-”

“-Why you’ve never heard of the ARTF?” The Admiral raises one eyebrow.

“Yes, sir.”

The Admiral leans back in his seat, a slow smirk spreading across his face. “Technically speaking, and in the eyes of the Fleet’s Intelligence Department, Mr. Kang, this force doesn’t exist. The General was strongly opposed to its creation.”

Everyone turns to Soobin with varying levels of curiosity, only to find that Soobin’s expression hasn’t changed in the slightest.

“No one can know about what you do here. Not your family, friends, or anyone else you may happen to share your day-to-day activities with,” The Admiral takes a bemused look at Beomgyu, who hasn’t stopped glaring at Soobin. “You will all be issued badges to reflect that you work in different departments.”

“I can walk them through the particulars, sir.” Major Jung whispers.

“Of course. I’ll just cover the most important part,” The Admiral says. “You will be carrying out missions with no contact to the base and no backup, should you require it.”

Lia swallows loudly.

“It shouldn’t be much different from working at Outpost 4417, huh, Ranger Captain Choi?” The Admiral smiles.

Yeonjun shakes his head. “No, sir.”

The Admiral opens his mouth to say something else, but a hand raised almost in his face stops him. Major Jung looks appalled, but the Admiral only smiles. “Yes, Engineer Choi?”

Beomgyu stares the Admiral down. “How were we chosen for this unit?”

The Admiral laughs.

“Y- You’re all qualified-” Major Jung begins to stammer.

“I’ve been working in R&D for the past five years,” Beomgyu says, ignoring him. “Surely two years’ field work experience isn’t enough to be assigned to a unit like this.”

The Admiral nods, granting Beomgyu another smile like they share some joke between them. Beomgyu continues to frown.

“Of course not, Engineer Choi. You haven’t been assigned here based on experience or credentials or _recommendations_ , don’t worry,” The Admiral’s smile widens at the deeply embarrassed flush crossing Beomgyu’s cheeks. “We simply believe that this group’s skill sets are best suited to the ARTF, and they should give you a better shot than the unit’s previous members.”

Yeonjun’s heart forgets to panic then. It just stops. _What?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> say it with me, fucking FINALLY everyone's back together again


	24. Running

Yeonjun looks around his room.

_My room._ It’s strange for him to call it that, even in his mind.

His first thought is that everything about it is too big. The room itself is the size of the mess hall back in the outpost, but without the greasy tables and chairs crammed into it, looks that much larger. There’s a desk with a holo-station projecting out of it, a closet that Yeonjun has to actually step into, and a wide bed with two pillows resting against the headboard.

_But why?_

He crosses the room, frowning at the floorboards under his feet. They feel like real wood. He reaches for the control panel of the floor-to-ceiling windows and switches them off.

The lights from the bright blue sky projected from the window display dims to the familiar dark curtain of space.

Yeonjun takes a deep breath. _The air here is scented,_ he realizes. If he hadn’t known any better, he might’ve thought it smelled like the saline breeze from a nearby beach.

Someone knocks on the door.

Before Yeonjun can even turn, the holo-display from his station zooms around to hover by his left hand, showing him a video feed through his room’s peephole.

Chaeryeong waves in the feed.

Yeonjun taps the _Open Door_ button on the holo-display.

“Hey, Yeonjun, how’s uh… How’s unpacking coming along?” Chaeryeong asks, stepping gingerly into Yeonjun’s room.

“I’m done.” Yeonjun had one change of clothes with him, and it’s currently sitting on one shelf of his walk-in closet, looking very lonely among the thirty-something other empty shelves.

“Oh, good.” Chaeryeong looks around Yeonjun’s room craning her neck like she’s at a museum. “They’re very nice, aren’t they?”

Yeonjun had been staring into space, quite literally. He turns away from the window. “Sorry?”

“The rooms.” Chaeryeong says. “When Major Jung said we were going to be given quarters I thought they were going to look more like, you know, _quarters_.”

Yeonjun hadn’t thought anything when the major had said that. He just nods.

Chaeryeong smiles. “I’ve always dreamed of having a place like this.”

“It’s the least they can do,” Yeonjun starts, before deciding against the latter half of what he’d been meaning to say.

Chaeryeong’s smile falters. “Yeah. You’re right.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“What happened to the previous members?” Yeonjun found himself asking, without bothering to raise his hand.

Major Jung’s mouth wobbled slightly, but he said nothing.

“I’m afraid I have a meeting to attend in a few minutes,” The Admiral said, suddenly rising to his feet. He glanced at his deep chrome holo-watch. “Major Jung, can you please take it from here?”

“Yes, sir.”

The Admiral gave them all a worryingly warm smile. “I’ll be going now. Pleasure to have met you all.”

Yeji, Taehyun, and the major saluted, but none of the others moved a muscle. If the Admiral was offended in any way, he didn’t show it. He just left. The door automatically slid shut behind him.

Major Jung let out a huge sigh, his shoulders collapsing in relief. “Okay, if anyone has any questions-”

Eight hands shot up before he could even finish speaking.

“Let’s go around the table,” Soobin offered, from where he was seated next to the major. He looked across the table. “We can start with Yeonjun.”

“Yes, good idea, Lieutenant.” Major Jung nodded to Yeonjun, who hadn’t raised his hand.

Yeonjun cleared his throat regardless, ignoring all the eyes on him. “What happened to the previous members of the unit?”

Major Jung leaned back in his seat, heaving another sigh.

“The other twenty-nine of them are in the Memorial.” Soobin said gently. “All that’s left of the unit are myself, Major Jung, and the Admiral.”

“How did the others die?” Yeonjun asked.

“It’s called the Anti- _Radical_ Task Force,” Lia said, crossing her arms stiffly. “You already know.”

Soobin only nodded in agreement.

“I think that, uh, you should think of this unit as the greatest, uh, service you can provide to the State and all the innocent people under it.” Major Jung said. “Not many people get this opportunity within their entire lifetime.”

“Let me guess,” Ryujin muttered. “Those other people’s entire lifetimes are much longer, aren’t they?”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Yeonjun! My dude!” Ryujin flings an arm around Yeonjun’s shoulders. She leads him like that, half-dragging him to the quarters’ kitchen, where some of the others are perched on bar stools around the central island. “Someone give the man a drink!”

Kai pauses, holding up a metal shaker while he studies Yeonjun’s expression with a hint of amusement. “You’re not going to say anything about how we have a briefing tomorrow at 0630?”

“No.” Yeonjun scoffs. “Why would they give us a fully-stocked bar if they didn’t want us to use it?”

“Good point,” Kai grins, unscrewing the cap of the shaker to tip Yeonjun’s drink into a glass before sliding it to him. “Here you go, Ranger.”

Taehyun stops sipping his aggressively fuchsia drink to nudge Kai, shaking his head pointedly.

“What?” Kai makes a face. “There’s nothing wrong with being a ranger.”

“It’s good work and someone has to do it,” Yeonjun says, smiling to himself as he does. He puts his glass down on the counter top, thanking Ryujin with a nod when the latter pushes him a chair.

“There are worse places you can be,” Ryujin says. “At least outposts are _dry_. The _Pizzicato_ had leaks all over the damn place.”

Yuna’s face screws up in revulsion, maybe from what Ryujin had said or maybe from her drink. “ _Leaks_? From _where_?”

Ryujin shrugs. “Engineering never figured out if it was the water supply or the sewage. The janitors felt like it was both.”

“Ugh, gross,” Lia makes a loud gagging noise as she pours herself another glass of wine.

“Wait, wait, wait, _wait._ ” Yuna says, waving her hands as if to silence to the others, who hadn’t been talking anyway. She wags a finger in Yeonjun’s general direction, swaying on her feet as though she had discovered the bar before all the others. “You were ranked _third._ How the fuck did you end up in an outpost?”

“Good god.” Taehyun sighs.

“Fuck’s sake, Yuna.” Ryujin says.

“Goddamit, Yuna.” Lia says.

“You don’t have to answer that.” Chaeryeong says. 

“It’s okay,” Yeonjun swirls the last bit of his drink in his glass. He gives Yuna a warm smile. “I flunked my psych eval.”

Yuna frowns.

“You don’t just bullshit your way through those?” Ryujin asks, pouring herself another drink in what seems to be the tallest glass she’d found in the entire kitchen. “Like, if they ask if you feel paranoid or shit, you just say, _Nah, I’m good_?”

“You’ve been _lying_ in your psych evals?” Taehyun gasps.

Yeonjun laughs. “Maybe I should’ve.”

“Yeah.” Ryujin lowers her glass for only a second, narrowing her eyes at the others seated around the kitchen island. “Come on, everyone’s done it.”

Kai stops shaking his drinks to smirk at Yuna, who lets out a garbled giggle.

Lia raises both hands like she’s under arrest. “Okay, fine, guilty.”

“Everyone pretends to be someone else for psych evals,” Yeji says with a small grin as she pours herself a drink. “Even just a little.”

“You too, Yeji? I can’t believe this.” Taehyun groans.

“Okay, in my defense, I’ve never taken one before,” Chaeryeong says. “I was supposed to last week.”

“Oh right, you only enlisted now,” Lia lets out a dreamy sigh. “Why the fuck did you do it?”

Chaeryeong falls silent.

“Isn’t it weird,” Yeji says, refilling her glass with some wine from the bottle that Lia’s been holding onto. “That this unit accepts people without psych clearance? Makes you wonder what they’re going to ask us to do.”

“The others just discovered the bar upstairs. You might want to join-”

“Go fuck yourself.” Beomgyu keeps sorting through the clothes in his closet. Most of them are ending up in a suitcase he’s got open on the floor, but there’s a growing pile of clothes on the carpet.

Soobin bends over and picks one his shirts off the floor, carefully folding it before placing it onto their bed.

Beomgyu shoves the shirt off the bed and back onto the floor.

Soobin sighs and sits at the edge of the bed. “Do you want me to bring anything ahead to your-”

“No.” Beomgyu says. “I’m not going there.”

Soobin frowns. “Well, now that you _know_ , there’s no point in us living here. The cabin upstairs is much nicer, trust m-”

“I’m going home.” Beomgyu transfers the last of his socks before slamming the suitcase shut.

Soobin stares at him. “Home?”

“The Moon.” Beomgyu rights the suitcase. “I could probably get some lecturing position at some Sector 3 university, they’re not _all_ shit-”

“Beomgyu.” Soobin says. “I understand you’re upset, but-”

“Upset? I’m not _upset_. Upset isn’t the word for it.” Beomgyu frowns as he tries to think of a better one. He doesn’t have that kind of energy right now.

“I couldn’t have told you I worked for the ARTF-”

“Really?” Beomgyu rolls his eyes. “Then did you have to lie to me about working in the Archives?”

“I wasn’t lying-”

“You and I have _very_ different definitions of lying-”

“I _was_ working for Archives when we met.” Soobin says tensely, stepping between Beomgyu and the door. “But I discovered the ARTF and I was transferred there against my- You heard the Admiral, we can’t tell anyone, not even our-”

“So was I supposed to find out at your funeral?” Beomgyu grips the handle of his suitcase until his knuckles turn white. “Or would I not have found out even then? Were you just going to leave me wondering how my boyfriend managed to die at a desk job in the Archives?”

Soobin lowers his head.

“I can keep a secret, Soobin,” Beomgyu says, pushing him aside. Soobin doesn’t provide any resistance. “Which you would’ve known if you’d just trusted me.”

“I didn’t want you to have to hide it. I didn’t want any of this for you.” Soobin says quietly. “It’s my problem, not yours.”

Beomgyu licks his lips, trying to think of a diplomatic way to reply to that. “The thing about being a relationship is that all of your problems are mine, too, whether you like it or not.”

Beomgyu slides the door to the bedroom open. His heart clenches when he sees the living room’s unsightly green chair, the cramped kitchenette with its ugly, matching yellow appliances, and the pair of coats hanging on a peg by the door. He’d gotten so used to how ugly this cabin was that he didn’t think he would ever miss it.

Soobin steps between him and the front door, again. Beomgyu lifts a hand to push him away, but he just doesn’t have the strength to.

“Get out of my way, Soobin.” Beomgyu says.

“You can break up with me,” Soobin says, his voice cracking as he does. “But you can’t quit the unit.”

“I’ll do whatever the fuck I want.” Beomgyu says. “It’s a free State. You can’t stop me.”

“I wouldn’t.” Soobin says. “But you know about the ARTF. You can’t just leave.”

Beomgyu drops the handle of his suitcase. “Are you threatening me?”

“Good morning, lieutenants,” Major Jung says as soon as he enters the meeting room. He’s not surprised to find that half the lieutenants are wearing sunglasses, despite the artificial sunlight outside not yet being activated for the day. “Seems like you’ve all had a _restful_ evening.”

Yuna lets out a pained noise like a wounded animal.

“Thankssir.” Taehyun manages to mumble out.

“We’re not yet complete, Major.” Yeji says, her hair pulled back so tightly you could probably play a song on it. “We’re still waiting for one more.”

“Where is Beomgyu?” The major turns to Soobin, who seems unusually engrossed in some file he’s reading off his holo-watch.

Soobin doesn’t reply.

“About that,” Lia says, adjusting her sunglasses. “Isn’t it even a _little_ unprofessional that they’re dating?”

“Gosh, Lia.” Chaeryeong groans.

“Lia, fuck’s sake.” Kai mutters.

“I’m just saying!” Lia says, with a wave of her hands that was probably meant to be less careless. “What if there’s some life-or-death situation and they’ve got to choose between _my_ ass and their boyfriend-”

“We’re not dating anymore.” Soobin says brusquely.

“Oh.” Lia sinks back into her seat. “In that case, forget I said anything.”

“We will.” Major Jung says, resting his hands on the table. He glances up at the clock on the wall. “Well, it’s 0630, I’ve got to start the briefing so you can leave in an hour.”

“Leave?” Kai frowns, or at least he seems to behind his large sunglasses.

“For your first mission?” Major Jung offers helpfully.

“ _Now_?”

“The unit has several unfinished missions,” Major Jung says. “We’ve just been waiting for a team to work on them.”

“Who’s to say we won’t end up like the other teams?” Ryujin asks. She’d been sitting at the far corner with her head drooping at an angle that suggested she’d been asleep.

Major Jung draws a sharp intake of breath. “Our former colleagues were uh, caught unaware by the technology the radicals have.”

Yuna, in her current state, manages to makes a face. “Such as?”

“They have bombs that block out all transmissions.” Yeonjun says slowly, staring at the glass table but not really looking at it. “They create dead zones for comms.”

Major Jung frowns at him. “Yes, and ones that can cool an engine down in a matter of seconds.”

Chaeryeong looks up, brows furrowed deeply. “Even in warp.”

“Yes, even in warp.”

A heavy silence descends on the room.

“The _Bravo_.” Taehyun says, barely above a hoarse whisper.

Major Jung sighs. “Yes, we discovered later that uh, radicals were behind what happened to the _EXP Bravo_. We believe they were after the engine and warp generator of an Academy microship.”

Yeonjun doubles over suddenly, burying his face in his hands.

“Yeonjun,” Chaeryeong rests a hand on his shoulder. Her voice and fingers are trembling.

Yeonjun shakes his head, face still covered by both hands.

Ryujin stands up. “Why didn’t anyone fucking say so?”

The major holds both hands up. “Ryujin, please sit-”

“Why didn’t anyone fucking tell us what happened to them?” Ryujin asks, kicking her chair back. She glares at Taehyun. “You were in Intelligence, right? Did _you_ know?”

“No.” Taehyun says, his face reddening.

“We’ve had to live with _shit-tons_ of PTSD! Shit-tons of it!” Ryujin shouts, storming to the front of the room. The major ducks out of the way, so she grabs Soobin by the collar. “And you couldn’t just fucking _tell_ us-!”

“It’s c-confidential information-” Soobin stammers, trying to pry Ryujin’s hands off his shirt.

“I don’t give a fuck!” Ryujin tosses him to the floor, stomping on the hem of his sleeve when he tries to scramble away. “Where’s Beomgyu?”

Soobin frowns.

Someone catches Ryujin by the forearm before she can throw a punch.

Ryujin glares at the neatly manicured hand on her arm. “Let me go, Yeji.”

“We’re all angry, Ryujin, but there’s nothing you can do.” Yeji says. “The Admiral has us hostage.”

Ryujin scoffs, jerking herself free from Yeji’s grasp. “He doesn’t have _shit-_ ”

“That’s the recruitment scheme around here, isn’t it?” Yeji asks, extending a hand to help Soobin up. “No one outside the unit can know about it. So if you know about it…”

“You can’t leave.” Soobin says quietly.

Yeji throws an arm out to stop Ryujin from lunging at him. “Stop. He’s just as trapped as we are.”

“This doesn’t make any sense.” Taehyun says, standing up. “They can’t force us to join a unit without our consent-”

“Did any of us ever consent to our assignments?” Yeji asks. “Yeonjun had to work in a fucking outpost. Ryujin had to stay in a dilapidated ship for years.”

Ryujin stops struggling against Yeji. “So what are we supposed to do, just fucking go with it?”

“Yes.” Yeji turns to the major, who’d shrunken away to a corner of the room. “Right, Major Jung?”

Major Jung nods wanly.

The room drops into another tense silence.

“Where’s Beomgyu?” Chaeryeong asks.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“I can’t fucking believe this.” Beomgyu said, throwing his suitcase aside. “First you lie to me, now you fucking _threaten_ me-”

Beomgyu forgot what he was going to say next, because Soobin’s just put his arms around him.

“That’s not going to work.” Beomgyu said, but he didn’t push Soobin away, because the latter had started crying. “That’s not going to work, either.”

“I- I tried to stop them from assigning you to the ARTF,” Soobin sobs into Beomgyu’s jacket. “I told them you falsified data and never learned to use a stun gun-”

“You told them _what_?”

“That you didn’t pass Basic Combat and you didn’t actually earn your PhD.”

Beomgyu slapped Soobin in the face so hard that he heard sound echo back off the kitchenette.

Soobin stood there, holding his quickly reddening cheek with one shaking hand.

“First of all, how dare you tell anyone I didn’t deserve my fucking doctorate, even if it was a lie.” Beomgyu said, curling his hands into a fist at his side. It was beginning to throb from how hard he’d hit Soobin, so he could only imagine how much pain he was putting Soobin through. _Don’t feel guilty. Don’t feel guilty. He deserves it._

“I’m sorry, my love.” Soobin whispers. “I didn’t want you to be put in danger.”

Whatever resolve Beomgyu had left crumbled away. He grumbled at himself, reaching up to brush Soobin’s hand away from his face. 

“I’m sorry for hitting you, you know how mentioning grad school gets to me.” Beomgyu said, guiding Soobin’s hand to his own face. “Hit me as hard as you want so we’re even.”

Soobin tilted Beomgyu’s chin up with one finger while he planted a kiss on Beomgyu’s cheek. “I’d never hurt you, my love.”

“Now you’re just making me look like a bad guy.” Beomgyu said, frowning.

Soobin hugged Beomgyu again, squishing his cheek against the top of Beomgyu’s head.

“Listen, if they’re as bad as you’re making them sound, then I am _definitely_ running away.” Beomgyu said.

“You can’t. I’ve tried.”

“Did you have an untraceable credit fob and a decoy tracker?”

Soobin frowned at him. “What?”

Beomgyu broke their embrace to walk to the kitchenette and whack the food processor they’d never used. The base opened up to reveal a secret compartment, which Beomgyu shook a few fobs out of.

“Why do you have those?” Soobin asked, his frown only growing deeper.

“Just in case you and I had to run away together. You kind of have to be paranoid when you’re dating the General’s son,” Beomgyu said, pocketing the fobs one by one. “Go pack a bag. Let’s go.”

Soobin didn’t move an inch.

“Oh come on, Soobin, I’m not going to pack a bag for you, surely you can do that-”

“I’m not going.”

Beomgyu nearly dropped one of the fobs. “What? The fuck?”

“I’m not going, Beomgyu.” Soobin said. “Maybe I would’ve before, but now…”

“Are they brainwashing you?” Beomgyu asked, walking up to Soobin again. “Do I need to de-condition something-”

“No. It’s all me.” Soobin said. “It really is good work, even if my life _is_ always on the line. What I do there is actually important, not just some shit to keep me occupied and safe and make my Dad happy.”

Beomgyu sucked on the inside of his cheek. He could see where this was going, and he didn’t like it.

“You should go.” Soobin said, resting his hands on Beomgyu’s shoulders. “I’ll cover for you.”

“If I go now, I’m not coming back.” Beomgyu said, fixing Soobin with a tense look.

“I wouldn’t risk it for as long as the Admiral’s in power, if I were you.”

“That means I’m not coming back to _you_ , too.” Beomgyu said slowly.

Soobin’s smile was sad. “I know. But you’ll be safer.”

Beomgyu’s vision began to blur. “That shouldn’t be okay with you. You shouldn’t be satisfied with being in love with someone and not seeing them. You should come with me. I’ll-”

“I’ll cover for you, my love.” Soobin said, cradling Beomgyu’s face in his hands while he kissed him on the forehead. “You’ll always be my love.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Where is he?” Chaeryeong asks again.

“He said something this morning about having some trouble with the bank.” Soobin says. “Perhaps we should just carry on with this mission without him.”

“We can’t let a ship go without an engineer.” Major Jung says.

“Um,” Yuna said, raising her hand. “The fuck am _I_? A joke?”

“The ARTF has two ships,” Major Jung explains. “They’re designed to function with minimal crew, but each ship needs at least one engineer, unless... Well, we're not yet in a place that we've got vacancies-”

“We can delay one mission until the first has returned, if that makes you more comfortable, Major.” Soobin says. He glances at Yeonjun, who’s still curled up in his seat, face tucked out of sight. “Since some lieutenants may need more time to adjust-”

“The Admiral is expecting results, Lieutenant Kim.”

“I’m sure he doesn’t want more funerals to attend, Major.”

Major Jung sighs. “All right, everyone, sit down.” He looks over the lieutenants, who look like pegs on a sliding scale between hungover and anxious. “As I mentioned, the ARTF has two brand-new milliships, the _Contralto_ and the _Cadenza_. Each ship is designed to operate with a 5-member crew, like the practice microships at the Academy.”

“So I presume we’re following the assignments from our practicum?” Taehyun asks, looking around the table suspiciously.

“Uh, no.” Major Jung says. “In this unit, we change the assignments based on the mission.”

Taehyun leans back in his seat, forehead creased as he tries to imagine the logistics of that.

“For this first round of missions, Team _Contralto_ will be shutting down a radical transmission hub, while Team _Cadenza_ will be investigating a suspected radical hideout on the ENS.”

Yeonjun looks up just then. “Radicals? On the Earth’s natural satellite?”

“Yes.” Major Jung pulls up a holo-display from his watch, stretching it at the corners until even Kai and Lia on the far end of the table can read it. “Here are your assignments for the mission.”

Chaeryeong doesn’t finish reading it. She turns to Yeonjun. “Yeonjun…”

“Why is Yeonjun listed as a pilot?” Taehyun asks before Yeonjun can even open his mouth. “He’s a captain.”

“Yeji received a special promotion to captain rank, we couldn’t just ignore that.” Major Jung says.

Yeji lowers her head. “I would prefer to switch with Yeonjun. Since the assignments are arbitrary anyway.”

Major Jung frowns, a vein bulging on his forehead from either irritation or confusion, or a terrible mixture of both.

“I don’t want to switch.”

They all turn to Yeonjun.

“I don’t want to switch,” Yeonjun says again, his voice as calm and even as earlier. “There’s nothing wrong with the assignment, and if Yeji’s received a special promotion, then I’m sure she deserves to be recognized for it.”

“Yeonjun-”

“I’m not so shallow that something like that would hurt me,” Yeonjun laughs, patting Yeji on the arm. “Don’t worry about it.”

Yeonjun slides the door to his room shut behind him. The rooms in their quarters form a semicircle around the circular common area, with Yeonjun’s room at one of the far ends. The lights in the common area are lowered to a dim standby. _Everyone else must be gone down already._

_Everyone but one._

“Yeonjun?” Soobin’s leaning against the couch. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m fine.”

Soobin seems to hesitate, gazing at Yeonjun so tenderly that it reminds him of something.

_Oh. My dream._

_Strange dream._

“I’m sorry the major brought up what happened all those years ago,” Soobin says. He even sounds like he had in Yeonjun’s dream. “I know it’s difficult for you.”

Yeonjun shifts on his feet. “Have all the others gone?”

“Yeah. Major Jung sent me to see what was taking you.”

“Sorry.” Yeonjun looks at his feet. He doesn’t know what took him so long, either. The major had given them orders to change into casual clothes, of which Yeonjun had only two sets to choose between. _I must’ve zoned out._

_That can’t be good._

“Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun notices that Soobin’s hand is on his arm. His fingertips are much rougher than Yeonjun remembers them to be, but just as warm.

Something stirs in Yeonjun’s chest, like an engine sputtering to life for a brief second before dying out.

Yeonjun jerks his arm out of Soobin’s grasp. _Beomgyu wouldn’t like that._

“We should go.” Yeonjun says curtly.

“Yeonjun,” Soobin says, in that voice that Yeonjun can’t decide he likes or not.

“Yes?”

“I didn’t get to thank you for saving my sister’s life,” Soobin steps back and bows deeply. “Thank you, Yeonjun.”

“Your dad’s agent did most of the work.”

“You don’t have to be modest about it,” Soobin says. “I read Agent Miyawaki’s report.”

Yeonjun shifts on his feet again. He’s not been alone with Soobin in so long that he’s forgotten how disconcerting it is. “I didn’t know she was your sister. I was trying to save everyone on that ship.”

Soobin smiles. “I know.”

Soobin looks back at Yeonjun, who’s stepped aside to let some freighters drag cargo taller than them through the narrow hallway. Without the bulk of a uniform jacket to mask them, Soobin can see the outlines of Yeonjun’s body. He’s tried to convince himself that Yeonjun looks well. _He doesn’t._

Yeonjun nods when the freighters thank him, before catching up to Soobin.

Soobin holds his forearm to the door to Port 2847-23A. The door slides open to reveal an ordinary, if a bit cramped hangar. The port is on the lower side of the _Descant_ , well into the area designated for deliveries and not Fleet ships.

The two ships docked just outside the hangar’s wide windows are definitely not Fleet ships, with their dull gray exteriors, dotted all over with bulky rivets that haven’t been used in shipbuilding from the time Soobin was born. Their windshields are half Soobin’s height, with no privacy filter to speak of.

“We thought you were never coming.” Major Jung laughs nervously, clapping Soobin on the shoulder. The other lieutenants are standing by the windows, whispering disdainfully to each other about the two milliships.

Soobin counts their heads. _Wait-_

“We found Beomgyu,” Major Jung says, with a laugh that, despite being awkward, sounds at least more relieved. “He’d gone ahead to check out the ships.”

“Excuse me,” Soobin says to the Major, walking briskly past all the other lieutenants.

“…no way they’d send us out in something like that.” Ryujin says with a snort.

“No, there’s no way.” Beomgyu’s arms are folded.

Soobin takes him by the arm and pulls him away from Ryujin.

“Hey!” Beomgyu yelps.

“Dude, _relax_!” Ryujin laughs.

Soobin pushes Beomgyu up against the wall, lowering his voice to a whisper. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“My job. What else should I be doing?” Beomgyu says, looking up at Soobin with so much faux innocence that Soobin is actually tempted to hit him.

“You weren’t able to get on the cargo ship?”

Beomgyu’s expression cracks, revealing his usual resting pout. “I did. But I changed my mind-”

“Why would you do that?” Soobin scowls.

Beomgyu shrugs Soobin’s hands off.

“Because I was thinking of the long, peaceful life I would’ve led on the run from whomever the fuck the Admiral sends after me.” Beomgyu hisses. Then he gives in to a half smile. “I’d much rather be with you.”

Soobin can’t help the smile that crosses his own lips.

“Hey, are you guys done?” Ryujin calls out to them.

Beomgyu looks up at Soobin, eyebrows raised as if to ask, _Are we?_

Soobin shakes his head. _Of course not._

‘I love you,’ He mouths.

Beomgyu grabs him by the collar to pull him into an open-mouthed kiss.

Ryujin starts laughing.

“Hey! Hey!” Major Jung grumbles, pulling them apart. “Please behave yourselves. You’re still covered by Fleet rules-”

“Not technically,” Soobin says, giving the major an amiable smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one's a bit of a whopper because i have no idea when i'll be able to update again, no thanks to work. 🙃🙃🙃 
> 
> thanks to everyone who's left comments, kudos, or wordless yells on this fic. despite being able to churn out hundreds of thousands of words for Bullshit, i don't have the words to explain how much you guys have made my day. take care! ❤


	25. Clear

“Holy shit.” Ryujin said when she stepped into the _Cadenza_. She reached out and touched the smooth cream-colored walls of the ship’s interior. It’s translucent, almost like a shell. “This ship is _fancy_ fancy on the inside.”

She ignored the common area and rooms on the lower deck, climbing the spiral stairs – made of that same, vaguely luminescent off-white material as the walls – to the bridge.

She tapped the lightly raised scar on her forearm against the door.

Her first thought was that the bridge was weirdly dark.

Then she realized why.

The top half of the bridge, the curved ceiling and walls which didn’t match the shape of the ship on the outside one bit, seemed to be transparent – Ryujin could see out to the exterior of the _Descant_ and the stars beyond.

She’d thought that she was past having her breath taken away, but she couldn’t help but gasp, mouth open in wonder as she extended her hands to try to reach for the bridge’s ceiling.

“Hold on a fucking second.” Beomgyu muttered from behind her.

Ryujin heard a scuffle behind her, but ignored it as she walked forward, touching the surface of the bridge’s windshield. It didn’t have the coolness or smoothness of glass, which made Ryujin frown.

“If it wasn’t you then who was it? The fucking Admiral?” Beomgyu barked out. “Let me at him! I’m going to fucking _kill_ -”

“What the fuck is his problem?” Taehyun said, backing against the nearest wall in worry. Then he turned and ran a hand against it, also baffled at the texture. “Oh, what’s this?”

“M- My _thesis_!” Beomgyu was so livid that spit flecked from his mouth.

“Please calm down, Beomgyu,” Soobin says, arms locked around Beomgyu despite the latter’s feral struggles. “I know it looks bad, but-”

“THEY STOLE MY FUCKING THESIS!”

Ryujin turned away from the view. “You did this?”

“Yes I fucking _did_!” Beomgyu kicked, but Soobin wouldn’t let him go. “I may not have the fucking patent yet but-”

“It’s beautiful.” Ryujin said with a silly, toothy grin. She couldn’t care less what she looked like.

Beomgyu stopped struggling against Soobin for a moment. “Oh, thank you, Ryujin.”

“It’s not glass?” Taehyun asked, feeling around the windshield like a child painting with his fingers for the first time.

“No, it’s carbon fiber with a special mineral alloy coating that mimics the surroundings behind the material.” Soobin said proudly. “Beomgyu developed the coating for his PhD.”

“And I applied for a fucking patent.” Beomgyu grumbled. “But _some_ sons of bitches decided to go and use it without permission anyway.”

“Well,” Kai said, from where he’d been leaning on the doorway watching all of them. “At least you’re benefiting from it now.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeji tries leaning back in her seat. The view of the stars all around the bridge is beautiful, and she knows she should be able to relax a little knowing that the ship had been built without windows, but she’s as jumpy as if she’d had ten cups of coffee.

_I haven’t done that since I was in the Academy._

She also hasn’t been in a captain’s seat like this one since she got out of the Academy.

“Captain? Yeji? Yo. Hwang Yeji. Hello?” Yuna waves both arms to try to get Yeji’s attention. “Fuck that, I’m just gonna report anyway-”

“Sorry.” Yeji shakes her head. “Go on, Yuna.”

“Uh, okay, thanks, anyway, we’re in full warp now and our ETA is like, six hours.”

“Thanks, Yuna.”

Yuna gives her a lazy nod before going back to her station’s screen. She and Lia have the same window open, and they seem to be coding something.

“What are you two doing?” Yeji asks.

“Nothing.” Yuna and Lia reply at once, quickly shifting to other windows on their screens.

“The ship automatically records everything we’re doing.” Yeonjun says.

“Bullshit.” Lia mutters. But she looks at Yuna, whose eyes are owl-wide as she shrugs.

Chaeryeong spins in her seat to look at them in mild amusement. “Does it really?”

“This seems to be a heavily customized ship, but it runs on the same OS as the 2223 Upper Echelon Fleet models.” Yeonjun says, casually scrolling through a black screen dotted with white text. “Everything in the ship is automatically recorded.”

Yeji drums her fingers on her armrest. “Including this conversation?”

“Yes.”

Yeji looks around, watching her crewmates’ faces fall into confused, uneasy frowns. _Except Yeonjun._ Their pilot just keeps scrolling through that plain, dark screen with the squareish white text. She doesn’t know how he knows what he knows, but she doesn’t feel comfortable enough with him to ask.

“So we don’t need to make logs anymore?” Yeji asks, smiling. “Since it’s all recorded anyway?”

Yeonjun turns around with almost a smile. “Sorry, Yeji, we’re still required to submit regular logs.”

“Dammit.” Yeji pretends to snap her fingers in disappointment. “Here I thought being in a constantly monitored rogue group would have its perks.”

Beomgyu had never been to Earth, though he’d thought about going many times.

The blue ball’s just come into view, at the far corner of the seamless view from the _Cadenza’s_ bridge.

Beomgyu remembers suggesting to the panelists at his defense that the coating he’d developed could replace windshields and windows, also getting rid of all the weak points on a ship stemming from people’s need to _see_ the outside of the ship.

The panelists had told him that it was a good idea, but it would probably take another decade or so before the Fleet adopted it.

_Hah._ Beomgyu thinks with a smug smile. _Only took the Admiral’s rogue ass a year and a half to fucking steal it._

“The natural satellite is orbiting on the other side of the planet, Captain.” Taehyun says, his face lit by his station’s deep yellowish screen. His face screws into a deeply embarrassed look. “I- I mean, Soobin.”

“It’s okay,” Soobin says. “Ryujin, can you put us in reverse orbit around the planet?”

“We’ll meet it head on?” Ryujin lifts both eyebrows.

“Not head on,” Soobin laughs. “But yeah, we’ll take the shortcut.”

“Got it.” Ryujin says, flexing her hands over the controls. Beomgyu sees the broad grin once she takes control of the ship’s thrusters. He smiles with her. He imagines she hasn’t had this much fun in a while.

“Beomgyu, report?”

“I’m a little hungry, but I’ll probably be fine until lunch,” Beomgyu says, spinning in his station to give Soobin a sloppy salute.

Taehyun lets out a loud groan, but Ryujin and Kai laugh.

Soobin pretends to roll his eyes in irritation. “Beomgyu, for real.”

“The engine’s fine. Warp generator’s finished cooling, and…” Beomgyu checks the other tab on his station. He’s not used to there being so much to monitor, but that’s what happens when you stop doing something for five years. “Mask system is fully functional. Who’d you steal _that_ one from? Dr. Heo?”

Soobin smiles. “Thank you, my love.”

Taehyun coughs pointedly.

Soobin blushes. “I mean, thanks, Beomgyu.”

Yeonjun looks up from his terminal. Something about this transparent bridge makes the stars seem that much closer, almost menacingly so.

He rubs his eyes. He’s been staring at the ship’s specifications for the past couple of hours, and the small white text has begun to burn itself into his retinas. It only took him a few minutes to realize that this ship is nothing like any of the ones he studied in his master’s program two years ago, but he’s spent the better part of his lookout shift unable to process it.

There are things in the kernel that he, even with the lieutenant-level clearance that the major had given him, couldn’t access. Something in Yeonjun’s gut tells him that even Major Jung doesn’t have the clearance.

_So who-_

“Knock knock.”

Yeonjun spins around in his chair. The doors in the ship are so silent that he hadn’t even heard Chaeryeong come in. “My shift’s up already?”

“No, not yet.” Chaeryeong says, rolling a tumbler between her palms. “I just couldn’t sleep, so might as well start my shift early. You can go rest.”

Yeonjun opens his mouth to argue, but he recognizes an order from Chaeryeong when he hears one. He shuts his mouth and powers his station down.

Chaeryeong rests a hand on his shoulder when he tries to pass her to the door.

Yeonjun stops to frown at her.

Chaeryeong opens her mouth to say something. Then she looks at the captain’s chair just a few steps away.

“I hope you don’t have any dreams.” She says finally, giving his shoulder a reassuring squeeze.

Yeonjun nods.

It’s only when he’s stepped into the darkened sleeping quarters that he realizes she said it to him in the Earth dialect.

“There’s the ENS.” Taehyun says, drawing a red circle around a gleaming object currently growing in the _Cadenza_ ’s view. It’s much smaller and plainer than the Earth next to them, but the part lit by the distant Sun glints like a lopsided smile.

Kai smiles back at the natural satellite. “You know they used to call the ENS the Moon, before-”

“Sorry to interrupt, Kai, but we need to initiate landing.” Beomgyu says, sitting up in his seat after slouching for almost the entire ride. “Ryujin-”

“Slowing down by 10,000 kph.” Ryujin says.

“Thanks.” Beomgyu blinks in surprise. He’s not used to working with people who are vaguely competent anymore. _Who are you kidding, you’re not used to working with people at all._ “Initiating rocky surface landing sequence.”

“Put the mask on maximum, please.” Soobin says.

“Sure.” Beomgyu says, flipping through the engineering station command list, which seems to have grown a hundred times longer since he last manned one. “Done.”

“Thanks.” Soobin smiles. “Taehyun, please mark a path to our chosen TRI-type crater for landing.”

“Yes, sir.” Taehyun pulls a 3D rendering of the natural satellite’s surface from his station. “Oh crap.”

“What is it?”

“The TRI-type crater’s…” Taehyun’s face contorts into a look of pure confusion. “It’s gone.”

“What do you mean it’s gone?” Beomgyu squints at the holo-model in Taehyun’s hands. “Entire craters don’t just disappear-”

“It appears to have been flattened?” Taehyun expands the hologram so the others can see. He draws up the map model he and Soobin had used to plan their mission out earlier, placing them side by side. Sure enough, a crater that in their view is the size of an ordinary dinner plate, is missing from the newer map model.

No one says anything for a moment, until Kai voices what they’re all thinking.

“What the hell do they have that can level a crater the size of a Sector 4 dome?” Kai asks.

“I don’t know if I want to know.” Taehyun shakes his head.

“But that’s what we’re here to find out.” Soobin straightens up in his seat. “Are there any other SOS-type or larger craters near the target?”

“No, sir, there’s only two ALC-types and one BIO-type. I don’t think the walls of the ALC-types are high enough to hide the ship.”

“No, we can’t risk that.” Soobin chews on his bottom lip. “What about the BIO-type?”

“The walls aren’t the problem there.” Taehyun says. “It’s only 11 km across.”

Soobin glances at their pilot, who’s been watching all this with a wide, blank stare. “What do you think, Ryujin?”

“I can do it.” Ryujin says, with more confidence than any of the others feel comfortable with.

Soobin takes a breath. “By spiraling down?”

“Uh, duh? How else are you supposed to land on a space that fucking small?” Ryujin scoffs.

“We can’t spiral down.” Soobin says. “The longer we stay in the air the more likely _they_ are to discover us.”

Beomgyu turns away from his station give Soobin a hard stare. “There’s no way even Ryujin could pull off a straight landing on a place like that.”

“I can try.” Ryujin says, both her voice and her knuckles cracking.

“Don’t.” Beomgyu scowls at her.

“Do you have any other suggestions, Beomgyu?” Soobin asks.

“Yes.” Beomgyu says. “We’re disguised as a cargo vessel. Let’s land on the cargo dock like one.”

“They’ll know we’re a fake right away.” Soobin says.

Beomgyu makes a face. “ _How_?”

“I don’t know.” Soobin says tensely. “No one’s ever come back to tell us.”

The entire bridge falls silent.

“I’ll do the straight landing.” Ryujin says.

“Or we’ll die trying.” Beomgyu mutters.

Soobin sighs. “Thank you, Ryujin.”

Beomgyu crosses his arms. “This is insane, Soobin.”

“I’m sorry.” Soobin turns to Taehyun. “Taehyun, please map the course to the BIO-type crater.”

“Y- Yes, sir.” Taehyun says, his finger trembling as he clicks the command.

“Everyone strapped in?” Soobin asks, looking around the bridge. Kai’s gone faint shade of green, Ryujin’s bitten down on her lips so hard it’s started bleeding, Taehyun’s hands won’t quit shaking, and Beomgyu… Beomgyu’s typing something angrily into his terminal. “Beomgyu?”

“Just finished running a check on the ship’s collision safety devices,” Beomgyu says, his voice dripping with rancid honey. “For when we crash?”

Soobin’s mouth pulls into a thin line. “Thanks.”

“No problem, _baby_.”

Everyone in the ship jerks forward against their safety belts as the ship slows down another couple thousand kilometers per hour.

“Sorry.” Ryujin mutters, teeth gritted together as her hands fly frantically over the ship’s controls. “But could you guys discuss your divorce _later_ , maybe?”

The _Contralto_ steps out of warp so smoothly that Lia literally blinked and missed it.

Up ahead is a structure that’s made of two yellowed cylinders intersecting to form a large X. Antennae jut out of the cylinders at odd angles, like pale arms reaching out into space.

The cylinders turn lazily to the other side as the _Contralto_ approaches it, revealing something printed along the breadth of their bodies.

_FPO 3976._

Lia lets out a gasp. “It’s an _outpost_?”

“Didn’t you listen to the briefing?” Yuna makes a face at her.

“I thought it was like, an abandoned thing, not an _active_ outpost!” Lia spins in her chair to look at Yeonjun, whose knuckles have gone white around the ship’s controls.

“Yeji, should we approach the North or South dock?” Yeonjun asks.

“I…” Yeji releases a sigh. “I’m sorry, Yeonjun, I don’t have any experience with outposts.”

“I understand.” Yeonjun says numbly, directing the ship towards the tip of one of the cylinders.

Lia’s about to say something when a notification blinks on her screen. “I- Incoming transmission from the uh, the outpost.”

“Play it.” Yeji says.

_“This is Ranger Lee Young-ae of Fleet Outpost FPO-3976_ ,” A calm, clear voice plays over the bridge’s sound system. “ _Please identify your ship.”_

There’s a faint click as the transmission ends.

“Ranger Lee’s not a radical.” Yeonjun says. “I know her.”

“What?” Chaeryeong frowns at him.

“She’s from the same outpost as me.” Yeonjun says. “She’s a kid. She just graduated two years ago.”

“Maybe the Major’s intel is wrong?” Chaeryeong turns to Yeji. “If Yeonjun says she’s not a radical, I’m sure she isn’t.”

“ _She_ might not be, but someone else on the outpost might be using their equipment to pass on messages for the radicals.” Yeji says.

“Everyone on that outpost has just been reshuffled.” Chaeryeong says. “If there was anyone, they’re not there anymore.”

“Not necessarily. Not everyone gets reassigned from outposts.” Yeonjun says tensely.

Everyone in the bridge glances at him in worry, but no one says or asks anything.

Lia doesn’t know what to think. She turns to Yeji. “Are you gonna record a response?”

“Yes.” Yeji hits the record button hovering above her armrest. She raises her voice a little bit, going into a more nasal tone as she says, “This is Captain Hwang Yejin of Fleet Cargo Ship _CGS-9833_ , we have a delivery of 2,000 meal packs.”

Lia hesitates, her hand stopping an inch away from the button to send the message. “Surely they can scan our ship and find out we _don’t_ have 2,000 meal packs.”

“They won’t.” Yeonjun says.

“Isn’t that like, basic protocol?” Yuna frowns.

“It is.”

“Please send the transmission, Lia.” Yeji says.

Lia’s fingers don’t move. “And what are we planning to do when we dock? Are we gonna _attack_ them? How do we even know they’re _actually_ sending radical transmissions?”

“Lia.” Yeji says. “Send the transmission now. Please.”

“But-”

“Fuck’s sake,” Yuna mutters, unclipping her seatbelt to reach across the space between her and Lia’s stations. She pushes down on Lia’s hand to press the button. “There.”

“Yuna.” Yeji says.

“No need to thank me-”

“I don’t know how they did things on your last ship,” Yeji says. “But _never_ do that again.”

Yuna lowers her head. “Sorry.”

Lia watches a notification appear on her screen. “They’ve granted us permission to dock.”

“Yuna, Yeonjun, begin docking procedure.” Yeji says.

Chaeryeong turns in her seat while the others hunch over their respective stations. “After we dock, what then?”

Yeji looks out the bridge’s seamless view, at the yellowed coating of the outpost as it draws closer and closer.

“I don’t know yet.” She admits.

Ryujin’s hands are starting to shake, but her muscles seem to have cramped around the ship’s controls, stopping her from letting go even if she wanted to.

Her station’s screen is infested with red warning boxes, so she’s looking over her shoulder and out of the rear part of the bridge’s 360-degree windshield to try to get a sense of where they are.

“Taehyun, update!” Soobin’s voice is nearly drowned out by all the warning beeps and sirens.

“15 kilometers to impact!”

“ _Impact_?” Kai cries. “Why _impact_?”

“Stop making extra noise, I can’t hear myself fucking _think_!” Beomgyu barks at the doctor as he desperately tries to mute all the warnings going off at once.

“14 kilometers to impact!” Taehyun calls out.

Ryujin grins in spite of everything. _Just like the good old days_.

“How are the thrusters holding up, Beomgyu?” Soobin asks.

“They’re literally about to fucking blow!” Beomgyu yells back at him.

“Are you serious?” Kai gapes at him. “Are you for fucking real right now?”

“No, he’s just joking,” Soobin assures him. “How are you doing, Ryujin?”

“Will my family get a lieutenant-grade pension when I die or will the Fleet not recognize the promotion?” Ryujin shouts.

“They- _What_?” Soobin frowns at her.

“13 kilometers to impact!”

A loud clang echoes throughout the _Contralto_ as the docking mechanism locks its rear end into the outpost.

No one moves from their seats.

Yeji takes a deep breath. Then she unclips her seatbelt and stands up. “Yuna, you can pilot this ship on your own, right?”

Yuna frowns deeply, but nods. “Yes.”

“Yeonjun and I will be boarding the outpost.” Yeji glances at the pilot, who gives a nod almost too readily. “If anything happens to us, the rest of you are to return immediately to the _Descant_ without us.”

Lia rises from her seat. “But the people in there are also with the Fleet. What are you afraid of happening?”

“I don’t know.” Yeji says. “But it’s better to be prepared. We’ll keep you on one-sided comms. Come on, Yeonjun.”

Yeonjun follows her to the door, but someone calls out from behind before they can leave the bridge.

“I’m coming, too.”

Yeji turns to frown at Chaeryeong. She doesn’t know how to kindly tell the doctor that she doesn’t want someone with no field experience going out into any possible danger with them.

“You don’t have any field experience, Chaeryeong.” Yeonjun says curtly. “You’re better off staying here.”

_Oh. Just like that, I guess._

“I know.” Chaeryeong’s hands curl to fists at her sides. “But I probably know more than you do about radical transmissions.”

The lights in the bridge flicker for a second, but return just as the dust clears around the _Cadenza_.

Beomgyu feels like he’d left his guts behind some 10 kilometers ago.

_But I’m alive._

_Oh my god, I’m alive_.

“E- Everyone good?” Kai calls out weakly.

“Yeah.” Ryujin says, sinking in her seat with relief.

“Yes.” Taehyun says, like he can’t believe it, either.

“I’m fine.” Soobin says. “Beomgyu?”

“I’m okay.” Beomgyu unclips his seatbelt, but he’s still having trouble breathing. _But it’s not the medical emergency type of difficulty breathing. It’s the regular old panic attack kind._

“Great job, everyone,” Soobin says. “Especially you, Ryujin. That was amazing.”

“I’m pretty sure we just broke the Fleet record.” Taehyun says.

Ryujin raises a hand in a lazy salute. “I should get a medal for that shit.”

“I wish we could give you one.” Soobin says. “But all of this happening off the Fleet’s record, so… Sorry.”

“Fuck this.” Ryujin ruffles her hair in frustration as she climbs out of her seat. “What now? We blow the radicals’ shit up?”

Soobin smiles at her. “Sorry, Ryujin, but you and Beomgyu stay here on the ship. The rest of us will-”

“Absolutely not.”

Soobin turns to Beomgyu with a long sigh. “And why not?”

“This is some bullshit. Ryujin’s probably the strongest person here, and we all know it.” Beomgyu crosses his arms. “You should be taking her with you, at the very least. But you’re going to leave her here so we can get away quickly if something happens? Why? To protect me?”

Soobin purses his lips.

Taehyun raises his hand.

Soobin frowns at him, but Beomgyu says, “Yes, Taehyun?”

“If we’re going to make biased, emotional judgments anyway, could I just stay on the ship?” Taehyun asks.

Kai raises his hand. “Same here. I’m getting married in a couple months, and I was kinda hoping to make it-”

“Oh, congrats, dude!” Ryujin blurts out, before quickly covering her own mouth and shrinking away bashfully. “Sorry.”

Beomgyu lifts an eyebrow at Soobin. He knows Soobin – or, in light of recent revelations, he at least knows enough about Soobin to know he can’t stand Beomgyu staring at him for very long.

“Fine.” Soobin huffs after a total of five seconds of Beomgyu staring him in the eye. “I overstepped and made a bad call, I’m sorry. Whoever wants to stay can stay, and whoever wants to go can go.”

Taehyun and Kai’s shoulders slump in relief.

“What if I want to go,” Ryujin says slowly, looking her crewmates over like she’s scanning them for weapons. “But I don’t want to be stuck with you and Beomgyu of all people?”

“Captain Choi?”

Yeonjun extends a hand to stop the cart Yeji and Chaeryeong are pushing behind him. He nods. “Hello, Ranger Lee.”

The young ranger breaks into a giddy smile. “Oh my god! It’s really you!” Then her face falls, seeing the dark brown uniform Yeonjun’s wearing. “Wait…”

“Could you show us the way to-” Yeonjun’s so surprised when Ranger Lee slaps him on the arm that he isn’t able to stop her. He shoots a sharp glance back at Yeji, who’s already drawn her stun gun. _Put it away_.

“How could _you_ be working in cargo delivery!” Ranger Lee cries, slapping him on the other arm. Then she buries her face in her hands. “I thought you were going to work at the _Descant_!”

Yeonjun ignores the look Yeji’s giving him. He’ll explain the farce that is confidentiality in an outer outpost to her later. _Whenever ‘later’ is._

Yeonjun lowers his voice, leaning in to near-whisper to the ranger, “I am, I’m actually working with Internal and we’re doing a surprise inspection on this outpost.”

Ranger Lee frowns. “I thought the surprise inspections started three months after Reshuffling.”

Yeonjun had forgotten why he liked Ranger Lee so much. She had almost as many Fleet rules and regulations committed to memory as he did. “Ah, they’re trying out something new. They feel like the outer outposts are getting lax.”

Ranger Lee frowns at him for a long time.

Yeonjun’s just about ready to reach for his own stun gun when she rolls her eyes.

“ _Getting_ lax? The people posted here are so lazy, they didn’t even _show_.”

It’s Yeonjun’s turn to frown. “What do you mean?”

“No one else is here yet, even though we were supposed to start two weeks ago.” Ranger Lee groans. “The place was empty when I got here.”

“What about the Outpost Director?” Yeonjun asks.

“Dunno.” Ranger Lee shrugs. “I haven’t seen-”

The ranger’s cut off by the cry of a stun gun discharging.

Yeonjun turns to find Yeji holding out her stun gun, still glowing from the blast. “Yeji, what-”

Ranger Lee lets out a loud shriek, pointing at something further down the narrow hallway.

Yeonjun turns to find a figure slumped at the very end of the hallway, where the corridor joins with another in a large L shape. He unholsters his stun gun and walks over, with Yeji trailing close behind.

The person crumpled in a heap on the floor is wearing a ranger’s uniform, but not the latest version. Their khaki jacket seems to made of the same material as the uniforms some five or ten years ago, and the pants seem even older.

Yeonjun brushes their hair away from the back of their ear.

Before he can see anything, the person lunges towards him.

Yeji shoots them with the stun gun again, but it seems to bounce off something just beneath the person’s scorched jacket. They manage to grab ahold of Yeonjun’s neck, their hands closing fast around his windpipe despite his best efforts to pry them off. Chaeryeong screams from behind him.

Yeji lets out another blast, straight at the person’s face, but it seems to ricochet off their skin without leaving so much as a red mark.

“Yeonjun-!”

Yeonjun flips his stun gun over and rams the butt of the gun into the person’s head.

They crumple into a heap in Yeonjun’s lap. Yeji quickly helps him up with one hand, keeping her stun gun aimed at the other person the whole while.

“Thanks.” Yeonjun gives her nod before bending over the unconscious figure.

“Wait-”

“Don’t worry, brute force always works for me,” Yeonjun says, resting a hand by the person’s nose to feel their breathing. Then he draws their long hair aside. Sure enough, there’s a slightly raised tattoo on the soft skin behind their ear.

⨁

“What’s that?” Yeji asks, only affording a quick glance down before going back to watching the hallway with her stun gun raised.

“They’re a radical. I think they keep their comms in here,” Yeonjun feels the raised bump underneath the tattoo. It slides away from his touch in a strange way, almost like it sensed him coming. “They don’t usually work alone. We should find the others.”

A loud crash from behind them draws their attention.

Chaeryeong’s just rammed the cart into Ranger Lee, who appears to have been trying to get away.

“Oops.” Chaeryeong helps the ranger to her feet, but her grip on the smaller woman’s arm doesn’t look easy to break. “Where were you trying to go?”

“I don’t have anything to do with this, I swear!” Ranger Lee puts her hands up. She looks at Yeonjun with big, watery eyes. “They said they’d kill me if I didn’t play along!”

“Where-”

Yeonjun’s cut off by a blast from Yeji’s stun gun. He turns to find someone standing at the end of the other hallway, completely unfazed by the blow. They’ve got a knife in one hand, the blade’s edge glowing with a bright, blindingly yellow laser.

He doesn’t have time to consider how they survived a stun blast strong enough to knock a horse out. He leaps to his feet and throws his stun gun in one go, knocking the knife out of the radical’s (he assumes) hand.

Yeonjun’s just gotten a punch in when a pair of stray hands fly in out of nowhere, ramming the back end of two stun guns into the radical’s head.

They hit the wall with a loud thump before crumpling to the floor.

Yeonjun finds Yeji holding his stun gun out to him. “Don’t go dropping this everwhere.”

“Sorry.” Yeonjun takes his stun gun and looks down this hallway. _This outpost’s a little bigger than 4417, but it should have more or less the same layout_. “The transmission room’s that way.”

Yeji pauses to pick up the radical’s knife, frowning at its erratic, jagged laser edge. “Okay. Let’s go. Chaeryeong!”

“Coming!” Chaeryeong says, dragging Ranger Lee by the arm, holding her stun gun with her free hand. “Stop moving, you’re making this difficult.”

“But I’m innocent! Let me go!”

“Shh! Just stop it! Please?” Chaeryeong sighs. “Please?”

“Stop here.” Soobin says.

Ryujin brings their ATV to a stop, hovering about a foot off the gray dust. Up ahead are a series of irregularly-shaped hatches on the ground, arranged in such a way that from above, they’d looked like nothing more than a group of scattered rocks on the natural satellite’s surface. “Is that it?”

Beomgyu leans over Soobin to type into the ATV’s computer. It takes him longer than usual, because the thick gloves of his exosuit keep hitting the wrong buttons.

_Scan finished_ , the screen reads eventually.

Soobin and Beomgyu lean in to read the results. The screen shows a series of tunnels leading down from the hatches, into larger, interconnected chambers deep below the satellite’s surface.

“No people detected.” Beomgyu says. “Looks like it’s been deserted.”

“So…” Ryujin squints at the 3D map on the ATV’s screen. “Do we call it a day?”

“They might be hiding from our scans.” Soobin says, opening the ATV’s glove compartment. He pulls out a rifle that makes both Ryujin and Beomgyu’s eyebrows lift nearly to their hairlines.

“Ho ho holy shit.” Ryujin says, backing up against the window.

“What the fuck is that?” Beomgyu asks, pressed against the opposite window.

“I have a license to carry it, don’t wo-”

“I don’t give a shit.” Beomgyu says. “Leave it in the car.”

Soobin frowns at him. “The radicals don’t hold back.”

“Again, I don’t give a shit.” Beomgyu closes a gloved fist around the rifle’s muzzle. Even with the exosuit on, he knows it’s not going to give him any kind of protection against whatever that gun’s capable of. “Leave it in the car.”

“Beomgyu, you don’t know what we’re up against.” Soobin says.

“Maybe you’re right, but I’m not about to let you… use that _thing_.”

“I’ve used it before.” 

“Maybe so,” Beomgyu says, his stomach turning. “But I’m not going to let you do it again. Not on my watch.”

Soobin lowers the gun into his lap, fixing Beomgyu with a deep frown. “Do you think I’ve survived this long by-”

Beomgyu wrenches the gun out of Soobin’s grasp, which offers no resistance as he dumps the weapon back into the ATV’s glove compartment. He turns to block the door to the compartment with his body. “Ryujin, get out. He can’t stop both of us.”

“Aye aye, Captain.” Ryujin says, pushing her door open.

Soobin tries, but fails to catch her by the back of her suit before she hops out. He frowns at Beomgyu, who’s already escaping through the opposite door. “I’m just trying to protect us.”

“So am I, Soobin.” Beomgyu says, extending a hand to help Soobin down from the ATV. “So am I.”

_REJECTED._

Yeonjun frowns at the screen. _It’s only been a month since the official Reshuffling, they can’t have changed all the outpost access codes that quickly._

“What’s wrong?” Chaeryeong asks, as she and Yeji tie the unconscious radicals to pipes running down the wall.

Yeonjun spins in his chair to face the woman cowering in the far corner of the transmission room. “Ranger Lee.”

“I- It won’t accept my login, either.” Ranger Lee stammers out, cowering deeper into the corner. “They d- did something to it.”

Yeonjun sighs.

“Brute force?” Yeji suggests.

Yeonjun takes a breath. _There must be a better way to do this_.

“What if they’ve rigged it to explode if we mess with it?” Chaeryeong asks.

Yeonjun, Yeji, and Ranger Lee frown deeply at her.

“It’s what I would do if I were them.” Chaeryeong shrugs.

“It makes sense.” Yeji turns to Yeonjun with a troubled look. “What do you think, Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun inspects the transmission room’s computer setup, feeling all around the back of the monitors and processing units. He finds nothing but black dust, which clings to his fingers like a glove.

“I can’t see that that it’s been rigged.” Yeonjun glances back at the radicals, who are beginning to come to. “But I can’t say that it hasn’t either.”

“So what do we do?” Chaeryeong asks, aiming her stun gun at the radical with the long hair, who’s started blinking up at her.

Yeji aims her own stun gun at the radical, but she flicks the safety lock off first. “What have you done to the transmissions terminal?”

The radical’s mouth curls into a smirk between the curtain of their hair. “Guess.”

Yeonjun’s surprised to hear a plain Moon accent from them. But the surprise only lasts so long.

He walks calmly to the far wall of the transmissions room. Ranger Lee flinches away when he comes close, but he doesn’t touch her. He slams a hand into the wall, opening a hidden panel to reveal what looks like a mallet almost as long as his arm. He pulls it out into the light. The front and back of the mallet’s head are made of metal, and are sharpened to a point.

“Yeonjun…” Chaeryeong says, taking a wary step towards him.

“What the _hell_ is that?” The radical asks, trying to scoot away, but Yeji had bound them too tightly to the pipe on the wall to allow that.

“What _is_ it, Ranger Lee?” Yeonjun asks, swinging the mallet up to rest it against one shoulder.

“I- It’s for breaking jammed doors in case of an emergency.” Ranger Lee replies promptly.

Yeonjun smiles. He could always depend on her to answer his sudden quizzes. He comes to a stop, standing over the radical.

“Yeonjun, don’t do anything stupid.” Yeji mutters quietly, as she steps out of his way.

Yeonjun just nods, looking down at the radical’s quaking knees. He grips the handle of the mallet with both hands, lifting it above his head.

“Yeonjun.” Chaeryeong steps between him and the radical.

Yeonjun spins on his heel and brings the mallet down towards the nearest processing unit.

“STOP!”

Yeonjun manages to swing the mallet out of the way at the last second, sending it crashing into the nearest wall. The dent it leaves in the metal surface is big enough for someone Ranger Lee’s size to comfortably sit in.

Yeonjun turns back to the radical. “What have you done to it?”

“Th- There’s a spiderbox attached to it.” The radical says. “It’ll know if you break the unit.”

“ _Spiderbox_?” Yeji scowls. “What does it do?”

“I- I don’t know.” The radical nudges their partner, who’s just started to lift their head. “What does the spiderbox do, man?”

“I don’t know,” The other radical mumbles. “Fee didn’t say.”

The long-haired radical looks up helplessly at Yeonjun.

_They can’t be older than twenty,_ Yeonjun realizes. _No, they’re probably both teenagers._

_Screw the radicals for sending a bunch of fucking_ kids _to do this._

“So what do we do now?” Chaeryeong asks.

“We have to complete the mission.” Yeji says. Then her tone becomes much less confident. “But I don’t know… how…”

Yeonjun lowers the mallet to the floor. The radicals both flinch when he does, screwing their eyes tightly shut.

“Take everyone back to the ship.” Yeonjun says.

Yeji turns to him, eyes wide in concern. “What?”

“Take everyone back to the ship, Yeji.” Yeonjun says. “Even the radicals. Lock them in a supply closet or something until you get back to base.”

“What about you?” Yeji asks.

“I’ll destroy the transmission terminal.”

Chaeryeong lowers her gun, reaching out to hold Yeonjun’s arm. “Yeonjun…”

“Do you have a better idea?” Yeonjun asks. There isn’t any sarcasm in his voice. He’s genuinely searching her face for answers.

Chaeryeong sighs. She doesn’t have any.

“This isn’t worth us losing a crew member.” Yeji says flatly.

“We don’t know for sure that I’ll…” Yeonjun trails off. He looks down at the radicals. “Are you sure you don’t know what’ll happen?”

“Don’t shut the terminal down.” The sleepy radical says, frowning at Yeonjun. “Please.”

Yeonjun folds his arms. “They’re going to take you two to our ship. Don’t give them any trouble.”

The radicals exchange glances.

Then they look up at Yeonjun and nod.

Beomgyu watches Ryujin open one of the hatches, then vanish into a dark space.

He squeezes Soobin’s hand.

“You don’t have to go down there if you don’t want to.” Soobin whispers over the comms.

“Hey!” Ryujin barks over the comms. “I’m already down here, you guys better come here _or else_!”

“You heard her,” Soobin says, lowering himself into the tunnel.

Beomgyu laughs. Then he follows Soobin into the pitch darkness. There are rungs built into the wall of the vertical tunnel, which he begins climbing down.

The hatch shuts automatically after Beomgyu, which is… _Less than reassuring._

There’s a loud whoosh of wind around them, then a sudden tug of gravity stronger than the gentle pull on the surface of the natural satellite.

The three of them tumble to the bottom of the short tunnel, surprised by the strength of the artificial gravity.

Soobin switches his headlamp on. “Everyone okay?”

“Yeah.” Ryujin says, steadying herself against the wall to help herself stand.

Beomgyu nods, but his legs aren’t as steady under him.

Soobin puts an arm around Beomgyu to hold him up. He looks around, casting the circle of light from his headlamp around the dark, dusty anteroom.

There’s a rust-covered door at the far end, with a round handle like a ship’s anteroom door.

Ryujin’s already pulled her stun gun out. She gives Soobin a curt nod as she flips the safety switch off.

Beomgyu fumbles for his own gun. He doesn’t miss being on the field, _at all._

Soobin turns the handle of the door, which opens without so much as a groan. He and Beomgyu exchange glances. Soobin flicks his headlamp off as they step through the doorway.

They pass through the door into a much larger space, lit by dimly glowing strip lights on the cavern’s ceiling. The path they’re on leads away on a gentle slope downward. Either side of the path is lined with low buildings that are little more than a patchwork of concrete and bits of aluminum and corrugated iron sheets.

In the eerie greenish glow from above, the makeshift buildings look uncomfortably familiar to Beomgyu.

“It looks like Sector 5.” Ryujin says, for them both.

“It’s been deserted, that’s what it looks like.” Soobin says, typing into his holo-watch.

The buildings hug the hills inside the cavern, as does the path, which seems to be leading them deeper and deeper into the cavern, into an area no longer reached by the strip lighting above.

Soobin extends an arm to stop them from going any further. His holo-watch is blinking faintly with a notification. They duck into an alley between two of the low buildings, Ryujin still holding her stun gun up to provide cover while Soobin opens the results of the scan he’d run.

Beomgyu peers over to read the report.

_Zero heat signatures detected. Zero cloaking or masking devices detected._

Soobin scrolls down a long list of things that his scan hadn’t detected.

_One active terminal detected._

“Where is it?” Ryujin asks.

“Aren’t you supposed to be covering for us?” Beomgyu narrows his eyes at her through his helmet’s visor.

“There’s no one else here.” Ryujin says, using her stun gun to point at the screen.

Soobin jerks away, frowning at Ryujin. “Please be careful where you point that.”

“Oops, sorry.” Ryujin lowers her gun back into its holster. Then she reconsiders it and pulls it out again to flick the safety switch back on before holstering it.

“Where is that terminal?” Beomgyu asks.

“It seems to be…” Soobin clicks through on the result for more details. “Somewhere behind us.”

They follow the coordinates through underground city, which is so silent that their footfalls sound like drumbeats in comparison.

They stop in front of a low building that looks like every other, but if the scan on Soobin’s holo-watch is to be trusted, is hiding something they want.

Soobin’s pulled out his own stun gun, holding it ahead of him and brushing Beomgyu behind him with his free hand.

Beomgyu shoots him an irritated look, but stays safely behind Soobin regardless.

Soobin reaches for the doorknob, but Ryujin beats him to it.

She lifts one boot and kicks the door in, jumping through the doorframe with a yell that crackles over their comms systems.

Soobin and Beomgyu roll their eyes, but step into the building after Ryujin, guns raised.

They find themselves in a cramped room with nothing but a damp mattress on the floor and a dusty computer terminal in the corner.

Ryujin steps towards the computer, but Soobin’s able to grab the back harness of her exosuit. “Wait.”

Soobin steps in front of her and kneels before the terminal, frowning as he runs his fingers all over.

Then his fingers catch on to something.

Soobin drops down on all fours, flicking his headlamp on. “Beomgyu, my love, can you lend me a hand here?”

Ryujin makes a gagging noise, but Beomgyu crawls on the dusty floor next to Soobin, flicking his own headlamp on. “What’s up?”

“This.” Soobin says, pointing at something duct-taped to the underside of the table.

Beomgyu frowns at it. It seems to be a small red cylinder the size of a soda can. “Is it an explosive?”

“I don’t know.” Soobin says. “What do you think?”

Beomgyu reaches for Soobin’s holo-watch, keying in one of the programs he’d snuck into Soobin’s watch while the latter was sleeping.

The scan takes a few seconds to finish. Beomgyu hears nothing but his, Soobin’s, and Ryujin’s breathing over the comms.

_Scan finished_. Beomgyu clicks through to the results. “Doesn’t seem to be.”

Soobin’s shoulders slump with relief. “Good.”

“So, what are we gonna do?” Ryujin asks. “Are we gonna call it a day?”

“I kinda wanna take this thing with us,” Beomgyu says, beginning to peel the duct tape back.

Soobin frowns. “Beomgyu, wait-”

Ryujin lets out a loud yelp, which has Soobin and Beomgyu both clambering away from the terminal. When nothing seems to have happened, they both look up at her with varying levels of annoyance.

She points at the computer’s screen, which is still dark, save for the words, _FUCK YOU ADMIRAL KIM_ , in big red text.

“It’s not an uncommon sentiment.” Beomgyu shrugs.

Then the text changes to read, _BET YOU DIDN’T EVEN COME HERE YOURSELF_.

Soobin staggers back, taking Ryujin and Beomgyu by the arms. “We should go.”

The text changes again. _HOPE YOU DID, YOU FUCKING COWARD._

The ground beneath them rattles, dropping them all to their knees. Soobin gets to his feet first, dragging Ryujin and Beomgyu after him. “To the hatch! Run!”

Ryujin nods and starts sprinting with all the grace of a puppet. Soobin practically carries Beomgyu up the dirt path. They’ve just made it over the crest of the nearest hill when the ground shakes again. This time it’s hard enough to collapse a few of the buildings around them.

“Keep going!” Soobin shouts when he sees Ryujin hesitate up ahead. He takes a deep gulp of the stale air in his exosuit, then lifts Beomgyu up onto his back. “Hold on, okay?”

Beomgyu nods into Soobin’s shoulder, wrapping his arms around Soobin.

Soobin nudges Ryujin forward just as the ground shakes again. Something crashes onto the dirt path next to him.

It’s a piece of the cavern’s strip lights, still glowing faintly.

“Go! Go!” Soobin shouts, as soon as he gets to his feet. He helps Ryujin up, though he can hardly keep his own balance carrying Beomgyu like this.

He just barely manages to drag Ryujin into the anteroom they’d entered through. The door slams shut behind them, but he doesn’t have time to think about that. Soobin gently lowers Beomgyu into Ryujin’s arms. “Please hold him, I’ll get the door.”

Ryujin nods, hefting Beomgyu up in her arms so easily that Soobin’s just a little embarrassed for trying so hard.

Soobin climbs up the narrow tunnel, hearing Ryujin climbing up behind him, somehow, though she’s carrying Beomgyu.

Soobin begins turning the hatch, but the entire tunnel shudders, as the rock beneath them lets out a loud groan. Soobin feels himself falling. He hears Ryujin’s voice over the comms, so loud it’s as if she’s right up against his ear, but he can’t make out what she’s saying.

He hits the ground with a sickening crunch. The ground beneath him shakes again, drowning out Ryujin’s voice. He can’t hear Beomgyu. He wishes he could.

Something falls onto Soobin from above, landing right onto his helmet with a loud sound he no longer has the words to describe.

Everything goes black.

Yeonjun picks up the mallet.

He closes his eyes.

The _Contralto_ ’s released itself from the outpost, and is hovering a safe distance away. Yeonjun can see the blinking dot of the ship hovering at the edge of the outpost’s holo-lidar screen range.

Chaeryeong had promised him they would wait and see what happened. “ _And if nothing does_ ,” She’d said, gripping one of Yeonjun’s hands in her own. “ _We’ll come right back for you._ ”

Yeonjun had only nodded.

_I don’t deserve friends like Chaeryeong._

He lifts the mallet over his head.

Tears well up in his eyes, hot and burning.

He realizes he hasn’t seen his family in seven years.

_But that’s all my fault, isn’t it?_

Yeonjun lowers the mallet. 

The computer crumples under the force, looking like a piece of discarded paper after just one blow.

Yeonjun holds his breath, waiting.

Nothing happens, at first.

Then he’s brought to his knees by this sound that’s both a deep, low hum and a high-pitched shriek at once.

Yeonjun covers his ears, curling into a fetal position on the floor of the transmission room. He tries plugging his ears with his fingers, with his jacket sleeves, with _anything_ , but nothing seems to work. It’s as if the sound’s gone past his ears, and entered his head.

Yeonjun wants it all to end.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun’s sitting on a wicker chair with a soft cushion. He’s on a balcony looking out at a glittering blue lake that seems to go on forever. The breeze is cool, but the sun above is warm, and Yeonjun’s so comfortable that his eyelids are beginning to feel heavy.

“Hey, I asked you a question, don’t fall asleep on me.”

Yeonjun turns to find an identical wicker chair next to his. Soobin’s curled up in the chair, hugging his knees. He gives Yeonjun a broad smile.

Yeonjun frowns. “What?”

“I said,” Soobin pretend to roll his eyes in irritation. “What do you want for dinner?”

Yeonjun stands up. The wooden slats of the balcony feel real enough beneath his feet, but something just feels wrong about all this.

_It’s Soobin._

_He doesn’t look like Soobin._

Soobin cocks his head to one side, giving Yeonjun a curious look. “Everything okay, Yeonjun?”

_I mean, he_ does _look like Soobin, but not Soobin now._

_He looks like Soobin seven years ago._

Yeonjun finds himself looking back out at the glittering lake. The waves seem erratic enough to be real.

_But this never happened._

“Hey, Yeonjun,” Soobin takes one of Yeonjun’s hands in his. “Do you want to rest? Don’t worry about dinner, I’ll-”

Yeonjun yanks his hand away from Soobin. “This is a dream.”

Soobin’s brows furrow, but he doesn’t say anything.

“This isn’t real. It’s all in my head.” Yeonjun says, backing away from Soobin. He only stops when his back hits the balcony’s railing. “I need to wake up.”

Soobin keeps frowning at him, but he doesn’t seem angry or confused. He only looks hurt, and it looks so real that it makes Yeonjun’s chest tighten.

“I’m sorry,” Yeonjun finds himself saying. “I’m sorry this isn’t real.”

Soobin shakes his head slowly. “But it is.”

Yeonjun, despite himself, reaches out to hold Soobin’s face. _It feels so real._

He closes his eyes when Soobin kisses him. He lets it happen, even though the guilt wells up in his chest like stomach acid.

Soobin’s lips move against his. Yeonjun realizes that he’s trying to say something. He leans away, frowning.

“Outpost…” Soobin mumbles.

Yeonjun backs away again, into the balcony railing. “What?”

“Outpost 3976 has been compromised.”

The world goes dark around them before Yeonjun can even begin to understand. The warmth of the wood beneath his feet and the chill from the breeze fade to nothing shortly afterwards, leaving Yeonjun with nothing but a vague sense of longing.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ⨁ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> starting next week, blue moon's updating every _saturday!_
> 
> you can follow my messy ass on twitter [@halp_rice](https://twitter.com/halp_rice) for previews updates spoilers etc hahaha


	26. Captain Choi

Yeonjun jolts awake.

The room he’s in is fairly bright, thanks to the multicolored streaks of light just outside the window. It takes him only a second to realize he’s back in the _Contralto_ ’s sleeping quarters, though he has no idea how.

He rolls over, peeling a sweat-soaked blanket off of him. Even now, sweat rolls down his forehead and neck, though the room’s pleasantly cool.

A bright circle of light blinks on overhead. Yeonjun shields his eyes with both hands.

“Oops, sorry.”

The light disappears with a soft click.

Yeonjun sits up, scowling at the way his damp undershirt clings to his back. He can barely make out a lanky figure standing by the door. “Yuna?”

“I’ll go get Chaeryeong-”

“Wait, before you do,” Yeonjun says. “What happened?”

“Uh.” Yuna lets out something like a snort. “You’ll wanna talk to Chaeryeong about that.”

“What?”

“I never usually say this, but I don’t fucking know.” Yuna says. “I’ll go get Chaeryeong.”

Yeonjun settles into his seat in the _Contralto_ ’s common area, feeling only marginally better after a shower. The rest of the crew had been having dinner, but they’d respectfully put their stir-fried pork away when Chaeryeong had put a bowl of unseasoned congee down in front of Yeonjun.

“The radicals?” Yeonjun asks, between sloppy sips of the soup. He’s stopped caring about what he must look like. He must’ve been asleep for days, though none of the others wanted to tell him so.

“Locked in the supply closet with Yeji.” Lia replies. “I’m going to bring them dinner in a while.”

Yeonjun glances at the sauce-stained plates Yuna’s loading into the dishwasher. Then he looks back at his own bowl. The congee’s so bland it doesn’t even taste like rice. “Do _they_ get meat?”

“Of course, we’re not animals.” Lia says, loading up three bowls with rice and pork before putting them on a tray.

Yuna places a few bottles of water on the tray, not bothering to stifle a yawn. “It’s my turn to sleep, right?”

“Yeah.” Lia says, lifting the tray. Yuna opens the door for them both, yawning again as she does.

Chaeryeong doesn’t say anything even when the door slides shut behind Yuna and Lia. She just keeps staring down at her mug of tea like it’s a screen, as she has been since she’d given Yeonjun his dinner.

Yeonjun puts his spoon down. “Thanks for coming back for me.”

Chaeryeong doesn’t look up from her mug. “Don’t ever do that again.”

“Sorry.”

“No, it’s not really your fault anymore,” Chaeryeong says, giving the tea in her mug a light swirl. Yeonjun has the feeling it’s gone cold. “You shouldn’t even be here. You should be back home, married, with a cute kid I get to spoil.”

Yeonjun looks down at his dinner, which has started to congeal. “I could say the same for you.”

“I could’ve had that life. There’s no shortage of nice guys on Earth.” Chaeryeong swirls her tea again. “And any kid from _me_ would’ve been cute, for sure.”

“You’re only 27, Chaeryeong,” Yeonjun says. “You can still-”

“Pretty sure no one in the ARTF has ever had kids.” Chaeryeong says. “Or been around to see them grow up, at least. We’ve gotten ourselves into some shit, haven’t we?”

Yeonjun makes a pointed glance at the walls of the common area before looking back at Chaeryeong.

“I know we’re being recorded, but I’m not saying anything they don’t already know. And anything they don’t know, I’m sure they’ll find soon enough. Speaking of which,” Chaeryeong fixes Yeonjun with this stare that sends a shudder down his spine. “You can hear them, too, right?”

Yeonjun looks at the walls again. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He says, in Earth dialect.

“Cut the bullshit, Yeonjun. They’re going to wring it out of us one way or another.” Chaeryeong says, in her drawling Earth-accented Moon. She looks up at Yeonjun with a bemused smile. “Who do you see in your dreams?”

Yeonjun briefly remembers Soobin looking at him tenderly and saying something. _But it hadn’t been his voice._

_“Outpost 3976 has been compromised._ ”

Yeonjun sticks his spoon into his congee, but it’s gone cold and thick, like drying concrete.

“It’s Yang Jeongin for me.” Chaeryeong says.

Yeonjun frowns at her. He doesn’t even want to imagine what that’s like for her. _At least I know Soobin’s not… Though he doesn’t care about me like he does in my head._

“I don’t know if it makes me feel better or worse now that I know it’s not really him,” Chaeryeong shrugs. “I guess it’s comforting. If it were actually him trying to send me messages, then I’m doing a shit job at responding to them, aren’t I?”

Yeonjun runs his spoon through the congealing soup. It draws a trough in the middle of the bowl for a moment, before the porridge slumps to fill the space. “So all this time it was just radical transmissions? That we can _hear_ somehow?”

“It seems so.” Chaeryeong says.

“How do you know?” Yeonjun looks up a Chaeryeong. _Surely, she’s not one of them. Even if she were, she wouldn’t be dumb enough to say all this knowing that the very force trying to bring the radicals down is listening._

“I found a transmission terminal of theirs back on Earth.”

“Radicals? On _Earth_?”

“I don’t know, I’d never heard of radicals on Earth either.” Chaeryeong shrugs. “The hub hadn’t been used for a long time until recently, so it seems. And it’s like the… my _dream_ only started happening again when they started using it.”

Yeonjun shakes his head. “That’s not possible. I’ve had these dreams since I was in the Academy. There’s no way there were radicals at the Academy.”

Chaeryeong shrugs again, but her shoulders stay slouched. “It’s just my best guess. I really don’t know.”

“Well,” Yeonjun says. “We’ll find out together.”

Chaeryeong gives him a sad smile.

“I promise I won’t die before we figure it out.” Yeonjun says. “Or at least I’ll do my best not to.”

Chaeryeong chuckles. “Same here.”

Beomgyu can’t breathe.

There’s something weighing on his chest, keeping him from using his lungs like he should. He tries to scramble out from under it, and that’s when he realizes it’s a person.

He manages to flick the headlamp on his helmet on.

The light falls upon a helmet identical to his own, but this one holds a pale face with eyes shut and blood trickling down from one temple.

Beomgyu suddenly can’t breathe again.

“Soobin?” He says, laying a hand on the other man’s chest. He can’t feel it moving. “Soobin? Can you hear me?”

Beomgyu hears a low groan over the comms system, but it’s not Soobin’s voice.

Beomgyu turns to find Ryujin slowly clambering to her feet, holding her left arm at an awkward angle. Her breathing in the comms sounds ragged and strangely wet.

“Don’t move, Ryujin,” Beomgyu says, though he doesn’t know how that will help.

Ryujin grunts and lays back down on the dirt. It seems as through the tunnel had caved in around them, and only a large slab of rock that had stopped them from being crushed.

Beomgyu looks back down at Soobin, whose skin has taken on a worrying translucent color.

He feels all around Soobin’s helmet, but he doesn’t find any cracks. _Soobin must’ve hit his head on the helmet itself._

He twines his fingers with one of Soobin’s limp hands. “You had better not be dead, you motherfucker.”

Then he lets go to start typing into Soobin’s watch. It’s been pushed to the limits of its own shock resistance, so much so that all Beomgyu can send is a general SOS message in every direction and hope for the best.

“I’ll take over from here,”

Yeji crosses her arms. “Shouldn’t you be resting?”

“I’ve had enough of it, I’m really not used to it.” Yeonjun says. “I heard it’s your turn to sleep.”

Yeji sighs, but she _does_ turn for the door. She gives the two radicals, tied up on the floor, one last, laser-sharp glance. It reminds Yeonjun of the looks his mom used to give him when she would drop him off at school.

“Good night, Captain.” Yeonjun salutes her.

Yeji salutes him back, but it seems to be nothing more than a reflex. “Good night.”

The door slides shut behind her. Yeonjun turns his back to it, looking over the two radicals with mild amusement.

They’ve both started crying.

“Oh my god, we thought you _died_.” The one with the poorly-cropped hair wails, rubbing their nose on the shoulder of their jacket.

“You’re fucking insane!” The long-haired one has snot dribbling down from their nose.

“Yeah, it says so on my psych evaluation,” Yeonjun squats next to them, looking over the cords tied around their hands and feet. The wrists of the short-haired one are starting to go red and raw where the cords rub against them.

Yeonjun reaches out, but the radical scoots away from him, fixing with wide, wary eyes.

“Sorry, I should’ve asked.” Yeonjun says. “Can I loosen them a bit?”

The radical shakes their head aggressively.

“It’s going to sting like a bitch if the skin breaks,” Yeonjun says. “Can I fix it?”

The two radicals exchange glances, frowning at each other as they hold a silent conversation with their eyes.

Then the short-haired one gives in and hops around in a circle to extend their wrists to Yeonjun. “Fine.”

Yeonjun holds their wrists together with one hand while he unties the cords with the other. Whoever had done this had taken their Survival 100 class at the Academy quite seriously. _Yeji, probably._

“We’re not telling you anything.” The long-haired one says.

“I wasn’t asking.” Yeonjun gives the knot one final tug. “How’s that?”

“It’s better.” The short-haired radical mutters.

“Good.” Yeonjun gives them a pat on the back before stepping back to sit at the far end of the room. Well, since the room is only a supply closet, he’s only two paces away from them. He leans against the wall, resting his arms on his knees.

The radicals exchange glances again.

“You’re not going to interrogate us?”

“No.” Yeonjun says. “I don’t think you guys know much more than we do, so there’s no point.”

“Excuse you, we know a _lot_.” The long-haired one says defensively, earning a rough nudge from their partner.

“Not that we’ll ever tell you.” The short-haired radical says.

“Like I said,” Yeonjun shrugs. “There’s no point.”

The radicals pout, but don’t say anything more. It’s just as Yeonjun figured. _They’re just kids._

Beomgyu’s eyes are shut, because there’s no difference between them being open and closed anyway.

According to Soobin’s watch, it’s been almost three days since they got caved in. He’s tried to stop looking at it, to save on battery, but he’s got nothing better to do.

Ryujin’s curled up on the ground next to him, snoring slightly. But there’s that weird choppiness to her breathing. _I’m not a doctor, but-_

_I mean, I_ am _a doctor, but… a really useless one._

He looks over at Soobin. Soobin hasn’t moved, but Beomgyu thinks he’s still alive, or he’s just hoping so hard that he believes it.

Beomgyu vaguely remembers lying on the rocky surface of an asteroid, looking up at constellations he doesn’t recognize. There are things he’s tried to bury under all the useless bullshit in his brain, but they bob to the surface every now and then, and he hates it.

_It’s when I have nothing to do that this happens._

_When I’m bored._

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Beomgyu knew they all hated him. He knew the entire crew of the _EXP_ _Fermata,_ barring none, hated his guts. He was rude, cold, and refused to join them for their awful Friday night get-togethers.

But he didn’t think even they’d be capable of _this_.

He was in his mobile laboratory when it happened, waiting for a spectrometer to finish trying to guess what’s in the latest sample he’d given it. He’d been humming a song that he liked to listen to, an old Earth folk song he’d heard someone sing once.

_You think you’re being funny?_ He remembered thinking to himself just then. _You know exactly who that was._

Suddenly he felt the ground tremble under his feet.

He ran to the mobile laboratory’s window, just in time to see the _EXP Fermata_ leave the surface of the slightly bluish asteroid.

He picked up his comms, unmuting it for the first time in a few hours. “HEY! WHAT THE FUCK!”

“Shit!” He heard someone from the _Fermata_ ’s comms department say. “Engineer Choi?”

“I’M STILL ON THE ASTEROID, YOU CUNT!” Beomgyu yelled into the comms. “TURN THE FUCK AROUND!”

The line began to crackle. “…s-Sorry… no can do…”

Beomgyu had never changed into an exosuit faster in his entire life. He ran out of the mobile laboratory, just to see the _Fermata_ drift further and further away. He ran across the surface of the asteroid, chasing the shadow cast by the gigaship, like that would do anything. “HEY!” He yelled over the comms. “TURN AROUND! I’M STILL HERE! WHERE’S CAPTAIN YOON?”

The line went dead.

“HEY!”

Beomgyu had run out of breath then, falling to his knees as the _Fermata_ was enveloped by the multicolored lights of the warp dimension.

“Engineer Choi, this is Captain Yoon of the _EXP Fermata_.” The captain’s low, rumbling voice came over the comms system, loud and clear. “We’ve been requested to leave this cluster at once, since radicals have been spotted in the area-”

“What the fuck is a radical?” Beomgyu asked, but the captain continued as if he didn’t hear him. _He probably didn’t. It’s probably a recording._

“…tried to contact you several times in the past hour, but you gave no reply. As per Fleet regulations, we assumed you to be dead, and are not legally accountable for any misjudgment on-”

“BULLSHIT!”

“…if you receive this message, please take care. I hear the radicals can be quite merciless.”

“FUCK YOU!” Beomgyu yelled with the last of his energy. He lay on the asteroid’s bumpy surface, looking up at the stars.

Then Beomgyu, for the first time in the two years since he graduated from the Academy, began to cry.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Beomgyu?”

Beomgyu blinks awake, though it doesn’t make much difference. He turns to Ryujin, whose breathing has gotten even more ragged.

“Do you hear that?” Ryujin asks. “Or is it just me?”

Beomgyu frowns as he tries to listen.

Sure enough, there’s this loud, almost mechanical groaning from above. Beomgyu feels the ground shudder a bit under him.

“Do you think they’re here to double tap us?” Ryujin asks. Her voice has a dreamy quality to it that Beomgyu wouldn’t have been worried about, if she’d been high on something. “Finish the job?”

Beomgyu sits up, resting a hand on Soobin’s chest again. _They might not have to try that hard._

The noise stops.

“Oh.” Ryujin says. “It’s gone.”

Beomgyu leans forward, resting his head on Soobin’s chest. He knows he won’t be able to hear anything, not through the exosuit helmet.

His tears hit the helmet’s clear visor loudly.

“I hate you, Soobin.” Beomgyu mumbles. “I hate you.”

Something touches his hand.

A hand grips his own, tightly as it can through the thick exosuit gloves.

“I’m sorry, Beomgyu,” Ryujin says quietly, giving his hand a squeeze.

Beomgyu nods, feeling the tears roll down his cheeks almost aimlessly. _The gravity here is shit._

Then the noise starts again.

Beomgyu feels something pulling him upward. Ryujin’s hand clenches around his. _She must feel it too._

Then, with a painfully loud crash, the rock above them disappears, replaced by a blinding light.

With the little battery power it has left, Beomgyu’s visor dims to protect his eyes.

Beomgyu finds himself looking up at a rusty milliship carrying a couple tonnes of rock in its tow field. The ship veers off to the side, and Beomgyu’s heart stops when it does.

Then it returns to his view, after having dropped the rocks off somewhere.

“Guys?” Taehyun’s voice is shaky over the comms, but Beomgyu’s just glad to hear it.

He waves both his hands. “We’re here!”

The milliship comes in closer, drawing the three of them and a handful of rocks up in its tow field.

Ryujin lets out a cross between a chuckle and a cough, suspended before the milliship’s bright headlights. “I thought you guys had ditched us.”

“What?” Kai’s voice is indignant over the comms. “How the fuck could we do _that_?”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Major Jung seems to pause at the door of the ARTF’s quarters, doing a quick headcount with his eyes before heaving a huge sigh of relief.

“Glad to see you, too, Major. Wine?” Lia says, pouring out a glass of wine that is evidently nowhere near her first. She’s sitting at the edge of one of the couches, next to Ryujin, who’s drinking beer in a competitive manner.

“Slow down, you just lost a rib.” Yeji says, frowning at Ryujin.

“More space for liquids, then.” Ryujin says.

Chaeryeong laughs hard, until she snorts some beer up her nose. She sits back against the couch, scrunching up her nose in pain.

“Get the Major something… drink!” Taehyun garbles, from where he’s slumped over in one of the couches. He makes a motion to reach for one of the many bottles on the coffee table, but decides to rub his temples instead. “Ahhh fuck this.”

Kai steps over Yuna, who’s decided to take a nap on the rug, to pick up one of the bottles of beer next to Ryujin. He uses his teeth to crack the cap off before holds it out to the major.

Major Jung doesn’t take it from him. “No thanks. Why aren’t any of you at the debriefing?”

“Oh, we thought that was a joke.” Ryujin says.

Yeji frowns at her, before giving the major an apologetic look. “She just got out of surgery a few hours ago.”

“Okay, what’s the rest of your excuses?” Major Jung asks, looking over the rest of the lieutenants.

“I think I’m drunk.” Lia says, raising her hand vaguely.

“Same.” Taehyun giggles.

“Honestly, Major Jung, a couple of us just nearly died,” Kai laughs. “You really expected us to make it to an 11 pm surprise meeting?”

Major Jung looks down at Yuna, then back at Kai. “The other three made it.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeonjun rose to his feet and saluted the Admiral when he entered the room.

“What the hell possessed you to take the radicals prisoner?” The Admiral barked at him, spit flecking into Yeonjun’s face. Beomgyu and Soobin sat up in their seats, frowning at Yeonjun. None of the others had arrived, but the Admiral didn’t seem the least bit bothered by that at the moment.

Yeonjun bowed. “I’m sorry, sir, it’s entirely my fault. I couldn’t leave them there-”

“You very well could’ve. Instead you exposed our entire unit, and for what?”

Yeonjun swallowed. “They were just kids, sir.”

“Those weren’t kids.” The Admiral said through gritted teeth. “They were raised to be like robots. Follow orders. Take lives without a second thought.”

Yeonjun was having a hard time imagining it.

“Just now they killed the guards I’d posted to their cell. With nothing but pieces of cord.” The Admiral said. “It’s a good thing they were apprehended before they were able to leave the _Descant_.”

Yeonjun frowned. “Apprehended?”

“Imagine what would’ve happened to the millions of lives on this ship if they’d been able to go back to their base and tell them all about it.”

Yeonjun felt his stomach churn, though it wasn’t because he hadn’t had a decent meal in days. He hangs his head.

_I didn’t even know their names._

“It won’t happen again, sir.”

Yeonjun had been trying to make himself say that, but he couldn’t. He turned to see Soobin standing, though he needed both hands on the table to hold him steady.

“Soobin, sit down,” Beomgyu said, resting a hand on one of Soobin’s trembling forearms.

“I’ll see to it that we train the new lieutenants better, sir.” Soobin said, managing a quick bow before collapsing into his seat.

“You can start with the one next to you.” The Admiral said, narrowing his eyes at Beomgyu. “Where is it?”

Beomgyu stopped adjusting Soobin in his seat then. He turned to the Admiral slowly. “Where’s _what_?”

“You know what I’m talking about. The thing you took from the radical base.”

Beomgyu glared right into the Admiral’s eyes. “I didn’t take any-”

The Admiral brought his hand down on the table in front of Beomgyu, leaving a cluster of large cracks in the glass under his open palm. “Do you think I’m stupid?”

Soobin tugged on the hem of Beomgyu’s sleeve in warning. He gave him a look that said, _Please don’t answer that._

“I think everyone’s dumber than me, Admiral, don’t take it personally.” Beomgyu said.

The Admiral let out a scoff. He almost smiled.

“You’re not the first engineer of the unit to get curious about the radicals’ things.” The Admiral said, drawing his hand back to his side. Yeonjun could’ve sworn he saw a little blood in his palms.

“I don’t see how we’re supposed to beat them if we don’t know anything about them.” Beomgyu said in a flat voice, ignoring Soobin’s insistent tugs on his sleeve.

“Soobin, do you remember Engineer Bae? Beomgyu reminds you of him, doesn’t he?”

Soobin lowered his head in an apologetic bow. He hands were shaking, and it was clear that it had nothing to do with his physical condition. “I’m sorry, sir, he’ll turn in… whatever it is right away, sir.”

The Admiral laughed. “You don’t even know what he took.”

Soobin looked at Beomgyu for a moment. Beomgyu was chewing on his bottom lip, shaking his head slowly.

“I’m sorry, sir, I don’t.”

“You’re just like your father, aren’t you? Very lucky, little else.” The Admiral turned away from them, seeming to head for the door. He caught sight of Yeonjun straightening up to salute him again. The Admiral’s mouth curled into a smile. “How would you like to be promoted to captaincy, Yeonjun?”

Yeonjun’s mouth had gone dry, so he simply shook his head.

“You’re promoted to Captain, effective immediately,” The Admiral said to Yeonjun, before giving Soobin one last glance. “I hope you still remember how to pilot.”

Soobin only saluted weakly. “Yes, sir.”

“Meeting adjourned, then.”

The door slid shut after the Admiral before Yeonjun could even realize what had just happened.

_I’ve done it._

“Fuck him,” Beomgyu muttered, helping Soobin into the wheelchair parked by the side of the room.

“Please don’t say things like that, my love,” Soobin sighed. “He’ll hear it.”

“I hope he does. Power-tripping asshole.”

A small part of Yeonjun’s heart, a part that had been ignored for years and years, leaps suddenly with joy. _I did it._ _I’m a Captain now._


	27. Zeroes

“Congratulations.”

Yeonjun turns. In the dim light from the open refrigerator, he can’t read Beomgyu’s face. “You don’t have to-”

“Just take it, Yeonjun. I mean it.” Beomgyu reaches past him to pull a carton of milk from the refrigerator. “Congratulations.” He says again, that flat, dead tone.

Yeonjun closes the door to the refrigerator quietly. “I’m sorry.”

Beomgyu pours the milk into a metal pitcher, holding it under the steamer to froth it up. “If this had happened a couple of years ago you would’ve bought everyone a round of drinks. Two rounds, probably.”

He places two mugs under the espresso machine, pressing a few buttons like he’s trying to punch holes in the machine’s sleek metal surface with his bare fingers.

“How’s Soobin?” Yeonjun asks, taking a few careful steps away from Beomgyu.

“He’s still having trouble walking, what with being in a coma for a couple of days. But otherwise, he’s just fine. Like this happens all the time.” Beomgyu says, tipping some of the steamed milk into the two mugs. “It really makes you wonder how many of those _family vacations_ he went on were actually spent in the hospital.”

The lights in the kitchen ceiling begin to glow a faint lavender, to mimic dawn breaking overhead. Yeonjun’s brow furrows in concern. “Beomgyu-”

“Save it.” Beomgyu slides one of the mugs to Yeonjun, taking a long sip out of the other. “You don’t like being pitied, neither do I.”

Yeonjun warms his fingers around the mug. “Thanks.”

“Was he like that when you dated?” Beomgyu asks, taking another sip of his cappuccino. “Tells you everything except the most important things?”

It takes Yeonjun a long time to say, “Sorry, but we never dated.”

Beomgyu chortles into his drink. He lowers the mug and rips a paper towel off to wipe his mouth. “Guess you had it even worse than me. Wow.”

“We really didn’t.” Yeonjun frowns.

Beomgyu’s smile is less than kind. “Well, only one of you is telling the truth.”

“I am,” Yeonjun grumbles. He’d forgotten how irritating Beomgyu could get. “Why would I lie about-”

“You don’t have to worry about hurting my feelings, Yeonjun. No one does that better than myself.” Beomgyu downs the rest of his cappuccino before placing the empty mug in the sink. “Could you wash mine, too?”

“Yeah.”

“See you later, Cappy.”

Beomgyu gives Yeonjun something akin to, but nothing near a salute as he leaves the kitchen. Yeonjun can’t even remember what he’d gone in there to do in the first place. He gives up and takes a sip of the cappuccino. It’s better than he thought it would be.

“Oh that’s good.”

“Yeah.”

“So you’re based in the _Descant_ hospital?”

“Yeah.”

“Not a lot of traveling?”

A notification pops up in the corner of Chaeryeong’s screen, saving her from another lie. “Hold on, unnie, my laundry’s done.”

“Huh?” Chaeryeong’s sister frowns in the video taking up most of Chaeryeong’s holo-screen.

“The washing machines here send you a message when they’re done.” Chaeryeong says.

“I don’t know how to say this nicely,” Chaeryeong’s sister says with a grimace. “But that is _so_ Mooner.”

“Yeah.”

“Anyway, I’ve got to open the clinic in a little while, so I guess I should log off.” Chaeryeong’s sister says. “You take care, okay?”

Chaeryeong can’t even begin to explain how much more complicated that is than her sister thinks. _I literally can’t._

“I will,” Chaeryeong says. “Send my love to mom and dad and the gremlin.”

“Will do.”

Chaeryeong waits for the screen to go dark. She doesn’t know how she’ll be able to keep up lying to her family. _Maybe I’ll have to stop talking to them altogether._

Just the idea makes her feel sick.

She powers down her computer and picks up her empty laundry basket.

The common area is darkened and empty when she steps out. A broad clock on the wall tells her it’s half past ten in the evening on the _Descant’_ s internal time.

Chaeryeong doesn’t bother switching the lights on as she makes her way to the laundry room. She hadn’t thought much of there being a laundry room in their quarters, but the others had found it weird.

“We can’t just use the central laundry service?” Taehyun had asked the major, looking more worried about his dirty clothes than he had when the major had told them about the unit’s usual funeral arrangements.

“No, the Admiral doesn’t trust them.” Major Jung had said. “There’s a lot you can learn from someone’s clothes.”

Chaeryeong pushes her shoulder to push the door to the laundry room open. She drops the basket in surprise when she sees someone sitting in the corner opposite the machines.

“Sorry.” Soobin says, pulling himself slowly out of his chair.

“No, no, it’s fine, I was just surprised,” Chaeryeong says, picking her basket off the floor. “You don’t have to get up.”

Soobin sinks back into his seat with visible relief.

Chaeryeong tries not to look at him while she takes her clothes out of her machine, but the community doctor in her is too nosy to not sneak a few glances his way. Soobin doesn’t actually look too bad for someone who was knocked unconscious, if Ryujin and Kai’s tipsy account of their mission is to be believed, for a few days. And she knows for a fact that the _Descant_ has equipment that weren’t even ideas back when she was in the Academy, but she just can’t believe someone would be all right just a few days after all that.

“I’m fine.” Soobin says quietly.

Chaeryeong dumps the rest of her clothes into her basket in an attempt to mask her guilty expression. “I wasn’t-”

“It really looks worse than it is,” Soobin says, giving her a little smile. “Still not as bad as the time I was shot in the head.”

It may have been a while since Chaeryeong’s studied human anatomy, but she remembers enough to be bothered by that idea.

Soobin notices her expression, and starts to blush. “I- uh, could you not tell Beomgyu about that?”

_He didn’t_ know _?_ Chaeryeong frowns. But she says, “I won’t.”

_Because it’s your job to tell him._

She reaches into the machine for the last few stray socks, dropping them into her basket before turning towards the door.

“There’s a table here for sorting,” Soobin says.

Chaeryeong looks back at him. He’s got that gentle, kind look that reminds her vaguely of the neighbor’s sheep. He’s exactly the sort of person her mother would love to have as a son-in-law: polite, helpful, and soft-spoken.

_Well, sorry, Mom, that’s not going to happen. For_ many _reasons._ Chaeryeong props her basket up on the table and starts picking the socks out first, bundling them off by pairs. Soobin doesn’t even peek at what she’s doing. He turns back to watching the other washing machine, which, in itself, wouldn’t have been weird to Chaeryeong.

_If we’d been on Earth._

_But he’s not from Earth, is he?_

“So,” Chaeryeong says, pushing her socks to one side of the table as she starts folding her shirts. “How long have you and Beomgyu been together?”

Soobin blushes all the way to his ears. “P- Pardon?”

Chaeryeong shrugs. “Where did you two meet? I mean, we all knew each other at the Academy, but you weren’t dating then, right?”

“No, we weren’t.” Soobin’s lips pull into an embarrassed line. “We started seeing each other around, uh, five years ago.”

Chaeryeong lifts her eyebrows at him as if to say, _And…?_

“I was working in Archives, and uh, he was… He was asking for a file that he wasn’t cleared to view, and there was a bit of a commotion.”

“Meaning?”

“Beomgyu called the Secretary of Archives a dickhead to his face.” Soobin says, barely holding back on his smile. “And asked if his head was ‘so far up his bureaucratic ass that he could taste it.’”

“Sounds like Beomgyu.”

“I had to escort him out of the department,” Soobin says. “And then we had dinner.”

Chaeryeong starts folding her pants. “And then?”

“And then we, uh… Then he took my fob and hacked into the archives while I was sleeping.” Soobin says sheepishly. Then he turns to Chaeryeong with his eyes wide. “But actually, he had every right to see that file, because it was about him, so I don’t think he was really doing anything wrong-”

“You don’t need to justify Beomgyu to me.” Chaeryeong says gently, fixing Soobin with an amused smile. “So why’d you go on a second date if he was just using you to get into the archives?”

“He’s the one who wanted a second date.” Soobin says. “But don’t tell him I told you that.”

“My question still stands.”

“I’m- Um… It’s just that… People are always using me,” Soobin’s casual smile fades into a deep frown. “But Beomgyu’s the only one who’s ever been sorry about doing it.”

Chaeryeong looks away from the pants she’s currently tucking into her basket. Soobin might have the same timid expression as the sheep that sometimes grazed behind her house, but there’s something in his eyes that makes Chaeryeong uncomfortable. They’re pretty eyes, of course, but the deep browns of his irises seem to run much deeper than they should, reflecting the lights off the washing machines in little flecks that flicker like distant stars.

Chaeryeong’s never liked looking out into space. There’s just too much of it.

“Soobin,” Chaeryeong finds herself saying as she stacks the last of her socks into her basket. “I know we don’t really know each other, and I don’t know if we’ll ever have any time to get to know each other, really,” His expression becomes even sadder at that. Chaeryeong takes a breath. “But I’ll never use you or your connections for anything. You can count on it.”

Soobin smiles, though it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Thank you, Chaeryeong.”

Chaeryeong just nods and lifts her basket, turning to leave the laundry room.

“Oh, and Chaeryeong?”

Chaeryeong stops just after sliding the door open. “Yeah?”

“Your first paycheck should be in already,” Soobin says. “In case you were planning to send some of it home.”

“Oh.” Chaeryeong nods. “Thank you.”

“Choi Beomgyu.”

Beomgyu doesn’t see anyone in front of him, so his eyes travel down slowly to a person sitting on the floor in front of him. “Ryujin?”

“I figured you’d be in there.” Ryujin says, nodding at the door to Soobin’s room.

Beomgyu frowns and gives her a nudge with one foot. “What did you want?”

“I’m losing my mind. The others are…” Ryujin says, groaning slightly and clutching her side as she gets up off the floor. Beomgyu makes a motion to catch her, but she brushes him away. “I’m fine, really.”

“You just had major surgery, you crazy bitch.” Beomgyu says tenderly, hooking one of Ryujin’s arms over his shoulders to support her.

“It doesn’t feel like it, really.”

Beomgyu wonders what kind of wonder-drug the Admiral’s personal doctor had given Ryujin. He figures it must be like any other kind of illegal drug, making the pilot think she’s invincible when she’s got a recently-sewn-up gash in her side. “Which one’s your room?”

“Third from the other end.”

Beomgyu nods and starts helping her down the hallway. It’s nearly two in the morning in the _Descant_ ’s internal time, which is why he’d through it would be a safe time to sneak back into his own room. _I forgot I live with crazy people. Silly me._

“What were you saying about the others?” Beomgyu asks, lifting Ryujin’s forearm to her door.

The sensor on the door beeps in recognition, sliding open to reveal a neater room than Beomgyu had expected. There only seem to be three pairs of boxers on the floor, and two bras hanging off the desk chair.

Ryujin seems to wait until they’re safely inside her room before saying, “They’re so fucking _rich_.”

“What makes you say that?” Beomgyu snorts. Ryujin hasn’t even seen Soobin’s house in Sector 1. _You could hardly call it a_ house _, really. An entire city could fit between the perimeter walls._

“Our pay came in today.”

“Yes.” Beomgyu says. “I know.”

“They didn’t even check.” Ryujin says. “They didn’t even fucking _look_ at their accounts. They were like, _Oh, okay, sure, that’s great, Ryujin._ ”

Beomgyu had the feeling Ryujin was mimicking someone’s voice in particular, but he doesn’t bring it up. “Ryujin, you _know_ most of them are Sector 2 assholes.”

“Yeah, but it just pissy to see it,” Ryujin mutters, breaking away from Beomgyu to sit at the edge of her bed. “The’re not even all Sector 2 jerks. Yeji’s family’s from Sector 1.”

Beomgyu tries not to react _that_ much. “Really?”

“Yeah.” Ryujin lays back on the bed, wincing when Beomgyu figures her insides rearrange themselves. “Her grandma was a General, so… yeah, their house is massive.”

Beomgyu can hardly help himself from asking, “You’ve ever been there?”

“Of course not.” Ryujin laughs bitterly. She looks up at the yellow glow of the light bouncing off the ceiling. “She’s been to my place, though. The old one in Sector 5, not my house now.”

“The bakery?” Beomgyu asks, reaching for the control panel to dim her lights some more.

He looks back at Ryujin when she doesn’t reply, expecting that she must’ve dozed off. He frowns when he finds her just staring up at the darkened ceiling. The lights are down to a weak near-orange so low that he can hardly pick out shadows.

“I’ve never seen that many zeroes in my life.” Ryujin says.

“Huh?”

“In my account. I’ve never seen so many zeroes in my bank account.”

“Oh.” Beomgyu would agree that it’s the biggest paycheck he’s ever gotten, but he can’t say anything about his account. It’s gone nowhere near running dry in the past couple of years.

_Because it’s a shared account,_ he realizes, his chest tightening in a weird rush of guilt.

“I usually send it all to my Ma,” Ryujin says. “But there’s no way she’ll believe that I’m still a gigaship secondary pilot with a salary like that. She’ll probably think I became a stripper or something.”

Beomgyu snorts. “That’s what my mom thought I did when I bought the new house.”

“Our parents don’t think much of us, do they?” Ryujin laughs.

“No, I think they have decent expectations, considering we’re not from… yeah.” Beomgyu shrugs. He turns for the door. “Anyway, you should get some sleep.”

“You too.” Ryujin rolls over in bed, flinching in pain. “Go back to your _own_ room.”

“Fuck off.” Beomgyu scoffs, closing Ryujin’s door carefully behind him. His own bed hasn’t been slept in since he moved in, and he has no intentions of changing that now.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“What is it?” Yeonjun asks.

“Nothing.” Ryujin says, turning around in the narrow room to film all sides of with the camera on her exosuit’s chest. The outpost’s transmission room seems to have been cleared out, leaving nothing but rust stains and areas clear of dust where the equipment used to be. “Literally fucking nothing.”

“Okay. Meet me at the rendezvous point.” Yeonjun’s voice comes over the comms.

“Yessir.” Ryujin tries not to laugh _. Trust Yeonjun to use stupid words like_ rendezvous. _It can’t be an Earth thing, because Chaeryeong’s not like that._

Ryujin steps out of the room and into the hallway.

She hears a faint hissing noise. She looks around, casting the beam of light from her headlamp all around her, despite the light from the flickering strip lights above already telling her all she needs to know. There doesn’t seem to be anything in the corridor but her.

“Ryujin!” Beomgyu shouts over the comms. “RUN, RYUJIN, RUN!”

Ryujin doesn’t take a moment to think about it. She breaks into a sprint, reaching the door at the end of the corridor just as it bursts into bright blue-white flames, throwing her to the floor. The door behind her doesn’t close, warped and molten beyond recognition by the blast.

“Ryujin!” Yeonjun barks over the comms. “Shin Ryujin, report!”

“SHIN RYUJIN!” Beomgyu’s voice cracks over the comms. “IF YOU’RE DEAD I’M GONNA FUCKING KILL-”

“I’M FINE, BITCH!” Ryujin says, trying not to groan so loudly as she clambers to her feet. The corridor behind her’s completely dark, either from the burns or the fact that the lights had all been blown out.

She hears that hissing noise again, all around her.

_God damn it._

“What’s that?” Yeji asks.

Yuna doesn’t look away from terminal, chewing on her bottom lip as she watches the computer struggle to listen to both her commands and the programming the radicals had forced into it. “Removes encryption.” Is all she says.

Yeji squats, looking at the little cube-shaped object Yuna’s stuck to the side of the radical computer with double-sided tape. It looks like a weird fob, but there are little scratches where someone’s pried the two halves of the red casing apart, probably with a screwdriver.

The terminal’s screen goes completely dark.

“Is that bad?” Yeji asks, frowning at the screen.

“God knows.” Yuna’s lip starting to bleed slightly from how hard she’s been chewing on it. She drums her fingers impatiently on the edge of the keyboard, staring at the pitch-black screen.

Yeji hears a sound from just outside the room, like one of the crates they’d passed had fallen over. “Lia, you’re _sure_ there are no other heat signatures in the warehouse?”

“Wait, I’ll run another scan.”

Yeji pulls her stun gun out her holster. Yuna jumps when she does, which Yeji finds a bit strange.

“Lia, update?” Yeji says, trying to listen through the door.

Yeji gets nothing in return, not even a little crackle of static. She turns to Yuna, who’s crouched over the terminal. The screen’s come back to life, flooded with tiny white text that Yuna’s scrolling through too quickly for Yeji to see anything.

Something _definitely_ fell over outside, much closer to the door this time.

“Lia, report?” Yeji asks again. She doesn’t hear anything but her own heart beating in her ears. “Yuna, we’ve got company.”

Yuna jumps again. “W- What-”

“I’ll take care of them. Get your stun gun ready.” Yeji says, resting one hand on the doorknob, almost immediately drawing her hand back. The doorknob is hot to the touch.

Yuna lets out a loud sneeze. “Do you smell something?”

Yeji puts the back of her hand against the metal door. It feels like a hot pan.

Yuna sneezes again. It’s then that Yeji notices that the air around them has gotten hazy.

“Yuna, we’ve got to go, now.”

“But I’m not yet-”

Yeji rips the terminal clean off the wall socket, swinging it into the window to her right.

“WHAT THE FUCK!” Yuna screams, ducking as the glass cracks.

Yeji lifts the terminal again, which is dropping off bits of broken casing and parts. She swings it into the window again. The glass shatters this time, but a mesh of fine wire remains in the window.

Yeji had forgotten how the people in the lower sectors built their buildings.

“Holy fucking shit.” Yuna gasps, pointing at thick black smoke creeping in from under the door.

Yeji slams the terminal into the wire mesh, but it only bounces off, as she had expected it would. They were in a warehouse in Sector 4. The windows were all designed against robbery.

“SOOBIN! LIA! CHAERYEONG!” Yuna screams into the comms. “GUYS! HELP!”

Yeji pulls Yuna down with her, until the two women are down on all fours. She frowns. If they had been in exosuits, they would’ve been able to run out of the burning warehouse pretty much unscathed. But she’d decided against wearing exosuits for this mission, since they _were_ on the Moon anyway.

_Idiot._ Yeji scowls at herself. “Yuna, do you have any wire-cutters on you?”

Yuna coughs, squinting at the wire mesh in the window. “Looks like carbon silk, not-”

“Yuna. Do you have anything?”

Yuna fumbles around the pockets in her pants, pulling out a set of wire-cutters. “All I have is this-”

Yeji takes them from her, switching them on. Their blade glows with a clear white laser edge. Tugging her collar up to cover her nose and mouth, she squats up to try cutting through the mesh in the window.

The laser edge skids against the mesh, sending off a few sparks to one side. A rogue spark lands on Yeji’s wrists, but she doesn’t mind the reddening welt it leaves behind. She opens the wire-cutter’s jaw all the way, holding only one of the handles to slash at the mesh with it.

All she gets are a couple more sparks.

“Dammit!” Yeji shouts.

“Get back from the window!”

Yeji stumbles backward in surprise. It’s not Yuna, who’s cowered in the corner. Soobin’s face appears in the window.

Yeji crouches, shielding Yuna’s body with her own while a deafening, high-pitched screech comes from the window behind them.

Soobin lands into the room with two heavy bootfalls. “Come on, come on.”

He helps Yuna and Yeji to their feet, giving them a boost out the window.

Chaeryeong’s waiting outside, carrying a sonic bread knife and the limp remnants of the mesh that had blocked the window. She’s also got a mask over half her face, but she coughs anyway in the smoke pouring out from the building.

“Let’s get them to the ship.” She says, crumpling the mesh in her hand. She slings one of Yuna’s arms over her shoulders, all but dragging Yuna down the abandoned street.

Yeji frowns at the bread knife Chaeryeong’s carrying. “How did you know-”

“Everyone on Earth has that on their windows.” Chaeryeong says, tucking the blade of the sonic knife away. Then she blushes a little. “And practically everyone knows how to break them.”

Ryujin hooks her arms around one of the handles outside the _Cadenza,_ watching the thrusters glow a faint blue as they pull the milliship away from the wreckage of Fleet Outpost 3968.

She looks over at Yeonjun next to her, hanging on the ship’s door, squinting as the explosions on the outpost are quickly snuffed out by the vacuum of space.

He notices her looking his way. “You all right, Ryujin?”

There’s a bit of a delay between the movement of his mouth and the voice that tickles Ryujin in the ear from the comms. Ryujin tries not to laugh. “Yeah, I’m good. I’d be better if there weren’t people trying to blow me up, though.”

Yeonjun grins. “I agree.”

“You guys just gonna hang out there or what?” Beomgyu’s voice comes over the comms. Ryujin can hear a little of Kai laughing in the background. It’s a distinctive sound, like the siren police cars use.

“Is the anteroom decompressed?” Yeonjun says, using his exosuit’s magnetic soles to anchor him to the ship while he grips the ship’s circular door handle.

“Uh, yeah, it has been for like, the last ten minutes.”

“Okay. Could you please decrease the artificial gravity by 5%?” Ryujin asks as she and Yeonjun help each other turn the door handle. Her legs are starting to feel like jelly from all the running she’s just done. _And in a fucking exosuit_.

“Of course, I’m not about to give you guys 100% gravity after all that shit. Do I look like I’m stupid?”

“Oh, and Beomgyu?” Yeonjun asks, just as he and Ryujin get the door open.

“Yeah?”

“Could you cut the bitching down by 5%, too?”

Kai’s screeches of laughter echo in the comms.

Taehyun isn’t surprised to find a few of the others waiting when their ship docks onto the _Descant_. The ARTF as a unit is nowhere near professional with each other.

He watches Beomgyu stumble almost immediately into Soobin’s arms, even before he hits the base’s artificial gravity. Taehyun looks away. He still doesn’t know what to think about the two of them, because he tries not to think of them at all.

He leans against one of the walls while he gets his bearings. He’d been working on the Moon for so long that he’s no longer used to jumping from one gravity source to another.

Yeonjun’s also been working in one place for the past seven years, but he doesn’t seem to have the same problem. He strides into the room like he owns it, stopping only when he sees Chaeryeong. “Hey?”

Chaeryeong’s shoulders sink in relief. “Hey.”

“Everything all right?” Yeonjun frowns at her.

“Yeah. I mean, we didn’t find much of anything, but we’re all alive,” Chaeryeong shrugs. “You?”

“The outpost was rigged to explode. Oxygen leak.”

“Oh, same.”

Yeji had been waiting off to one side, reading something on a tablet while she fumbled with the hem of her oversized cardigan. She looks up only when Kai steps aboard.

_What?_ Taehyun frowns.

“You okay?” Yeji asks him, in the same tone she uses to ask for reports.

“Yeah.” Kai smiles at her. “I guess you’re okay, too?”

“Yes.”

Taehyun looks out the window, pretending to mind his own business, but he can hardly do otherwise when no one’s making much of a secret of their own business.

“Hey, what’re you doing here?” Ryujin asks when she sees Yeji.

“Am I not allowed to be?” Yeji asks irritably, though her ears are burning red.

“Woah, chill, I’m just asking,” Ryujin laughs, running a hand through her hastily-cropped hair that Taehyun has always suspected she cuts herself. _With a bread knife, probably._ “I’m happy to see you, too, Yeji.”

Yeji just turns and stomps towards the exit without saying another word.

Taehyun’s decided that he’s had enough of the rest of the unit, too. He has a full-sized bathtub waiting for him upstairs. _My new order of bath salts should be in, too._

There’s something about nearly every mission of theirs ending up in explosions that’s making him lean on warm baths like a crutch.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Good morning, lieutenants. Good to see you all again,” Major Jung says as he enters the meeting room on the _Descant_ ’s 2301st floor. “The Admiral extends his sincerest apologies-”

“Oh, he’s not here again?” Lia asks, straightening up in her seat.

“No, he’s busy.” Major Jung says, trying to ignore the grins that break out among the lieutenants. He knows for a fact that they’re all adults now, but every now and then, when they act like this, it makes it hard for him not to think of them as teenagers again. “But he’ll be going over the minutes of the meeting. Who will-”

“Taehyun.” Beomgyu and Ryujin say at once, nodding over to Taehyun, who lifts the notes he’s taking on the screen of his holo-watch.

“Right.” Major Jung rolls his shoulders, which give out a loud crack. “Let’s start the debrief, captains.”

He’s only just settled into his chair when Yeonjun starts talking.

“Team _Contralto_ ’s fifth mission was unsuccessful, sir.” Yeonjun says, his voice as calm and even as if he were reporting the weekly electricity prices. “The radical base on Asteroid 31490-DC seems to have been cleared long before we arrived.”

Major Jung frowns. “What makes you say so?”

“The internal walls of the underground base were infested with black mold in a late stage of sporulation, sir.” Yeonjun says. “It not only makes the base virtually unlivable, but would suggest that it’s been uninhabited for at least a month.”

“Since when were you an expert on black mold, Yeonjun?”

“I’m not, sir.” Yeonjun says brightly. “Ryujin is.”

Major Jung looks at the pilot with a healthy amount of skepticism. Ryujin’s currently using a twig from the floral arrangement in the middle of the table to pick at something in her teeth. Major Jung says nothing, but the Admiral has made that floral arrangement himself, and probably won’t be happy to know it’s been repurposed for one of the lieutenants’ dental hygiene.

“O- Oh, yeah.” Ryujin says, pocketing the twig suddenly. She gives Major Jung a sheepish grin with a piece of what looks like meat caught between her teeth. “The last ship I was on was full of mold. It’s got like, four stages, where it goes from like wettish and kind of slimy to fuzzy to bubbly to flat again and each stage is a week-ish, depending on how hot it is.”

The major just frowns at her and the string of meat caught in her smile.

“It’s all in her report, sir.” Yeonjun says.

Major Jung doesn’t know how he feels about having to read that report, because he knows the Admiral definitely won’t, and will expect _him_ to. But he remembers that one time he taught _Basic Piloting_ that he’d made the mistake of requiring a short paper. The others’ papers had given him a migraine that it had taken a couple mild painkillers to fix.

Shin Ryujin’s paper had driven him to tequila.

“All of us helped her write it, sir.” Yuna offers, probably seeing the sheer horror on Major Jung’s face.

“Very well then, I’ll have a look at it later.” The major nods, shoulders sagging in relief. “Anything else to report, Yeonjun?”

“It’s just strange, sir-” Yeonjun catches a sharp look from Yeji, who shakes her head. Yeonjun gives the major a curt nod. “Nothing, sir.”

“Thank you, Yeonjun.” Major Jung says, turning to the other captain. Yeji’s still frowning at Yeonjun, both of them locked in a silent battle of scrunching eyebrows at each other. “Yeji?”

“Y- Yes, sir.” Yeji stands up, suddenly realizing it’s weird of her to do so, before sinking into her seat while her ears redden. “Team _Cadenza_ ’s fifth mission was unsuccessful as well.”

Major Jung notices the way that all the lieutenants are looking at him. They’re expecting some kind of reaction from him. He manages his expression to a slight frown as he leans back in his seat. “What happened?”

“The suspected radicals in the base had already been reported as AWOL, sir.” Yeji says. “A few days before we arrived.”

Major Jung nods slowly, his brows folding into a deeper frown.

“And they left a- a message.” Yeji says.

All the lieutenants watch Major Jung closely again. The major hates it, but it’s nothing he can’t deal with. “What was the message?”

“We have a photo,” Yeji says, nodding to Lia. “Lia?”

“Yup.” Lia taps onto her holo-watch, which projects an image onto the nearest wall. It’s a fairly grainy photo, taken in a dim room with craggy walls like a cave.

The rough stone wall in question has something written on it in a hasty spray-paint job:

_Before you come for us_

_Take a look at your own men, Admiral_

⨁

Major Jung clears his throat after a long silence. “Is that in your report, Yeji?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And what do you think of it?”

“I don’t-” Yeji takes a breath, composing herself. “It’s probably a ploy to get us to turn against each other, sir.”

“I think so, too.” Major Jung smiles at her. He’s glad to have Hwang Yeji in the unit, just a little more than he’s bothered by the risk of losing her. Actually, he’s glad to have them all, even the ones he had never taught in the Academy. And at the same time, he fears losing every single one of them, especially the ones he had never taught in the Academy.

“But it doesn’t make sense, sir.”

Major Jung turns to Yeonjun. “Why not, Yeonjun?”

“That means they know about us.”


	28. Believe Me

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Ryujin heard the front door open and close above the crackle of the oil in her pan.

She turned the heat down a little bit, leaning out the archway into the quarters’ common area. She never had the stomach to go to the dock to see if the other team had gotten back safely – _Because what would I do if they didn’t? –_ but she wasn’t about to act like nothing’s going on when they got home, either.

_Home? Should I be calling this place home?_

Yeji trudged through the front door, looking dead ahead, but at nothing in particular at the same time. She didn’t even notice Ryujin hanging by the archway to the kitchen.

“Hey,” Ryujin said carefully, the sort of careful you have to be sticking your head into the open jaws of an alligator.

Yeji looked at her with a worryingly mild expression. Ryujin waited for Yeji to snap at her, but it never came.

“Did… anything happen?” Ryujin asked, her stomach turning just at the idea.

Yeji sniffed. Ryujin was worried she was crying, but Yeji’s expression became slightly alarmed. “Is something burning?”

“Oh shit.” Ryujin ran back into the kitchen, fanning the thin haze of smoke coming off the blackened formerly-chicken-wings in her pan. “I’m so fucking used to everything being on fire all the time. I wouldn’t be surprised if the fucking radicals burnt my chicken.”

Yeji chuckled, which had worried Ryujin more than if Yeji hadn’t.

Ryujin plucked the burnt chicken pieces out of the oil and dumped them straight to the trash before one of their more intelligent coworkers could accidentally eat it while they were busy thinking, or something like that.

She found Yeji looking over the bowl of batter-soaked wings.

“This is a lot.” Yeji said.

“Hey.” Ryujin said, folding her arms. “It’s not just for me, it’s for everyone-”

“We’re all capable of cooking our own dinner.”

“Uh, yeah, don’t start on that.” Ryujin snorted, fishing the tiny bits of burnt breading out of the oil. “We’ve all been eating dinner together for months now- Why are you looking at me like that, Yeji? Please stop.”

Yeji laughed. “Sorry. I was just thinking.”

Ryujin busied herself with dropping a few of the wings into the oil so she’d have a reason to look away. “How was your mission? Did something happen?”

Yeji gave Ryujin a smile that concerned Ryujin more than anything else. “Isn’t it funny that we all trust each other so much?”

“We all know each other.” Ryujin said, fixing Yeji with a deep frown. _You and I more than anyone else here._

“From a long time ago.” Yeji said. “Who knows what’s happened since then?”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“So,” Taehyun says, breaking the silence. “It’s got to be one of us.”

The others avoid his eyes. They’re all sitting around the living room, drinks in hand, as they do after every mission, but no one’s taken a sip.

“We’re not the entire unit.” Beomgyu says. “It could be Major Jung. Or Admiral Fucking Kim, for all we know.”

“Why would the Admiral be sabotaging his _own_ illegal unit?” Yuna scowls at him.

“The message was addressed to him,” Chaeryeong says. “So he’s probably not the spy.”

“If there _is_ one.” Yeji cuts in.

“There’s got to be one.” Yeonjun says.

“Yeah, there’s no other explanation.” Soobin agrees. “They know about our unit-”

“Hey Soobin,” Lia says, swirling her quickly melting margarita. “You’re the only living member of the previous ARTF unit, right?”

Soobin frowns at her.

“Yeah, and what of it?” Beomgyu asks.

“Nothing,” Lia hums, leaning back in her seat, watching the ice melt in her glass. “Just saying.”

“Choi Lia,” Beomgyu puts his glass down. “If you turn out to be the snitch I swear I’m going to-”

“Beomgyu.” Yeonjun and Soobin say at once. They exchange frowns before looking back down at their drinks.

“We don’t have anything to gain from fighting each other.” Chaeryeong says, pulling her feet up on the couch to hug her knees.

“So what, we should just pretend we don’t know anything?” Yuna scoffs.

“Yes.” Kai says. “We should, if we want to keep working together without going insane.”

“That’s ridiculous.” Yeji says. “Someone in this room is trying to get us all killed. Are you expecting us to just-”

“ _Trying to get us all killed_ is a bit fucking extreme,” Ryujin mutters. The bottle of beer in her hands is miraculously unopened.

“She’s right, though.” Taehyun says. “We’re just lucky no one’s died yet.”

“Where are you going?”

Chaeryeong stops in the middle of buttoning up her coat. “The bank.”

Two pairs of suspicious eyes focus on her.

Chaeryeong finds Lia and Taehyun sitting on the couch, narrowing their eyes suspiciously at her. She sighs. They would’ve been threatening, if they hadn’t both been wearing flannel pajamas and soft house slippers. She sighs. “It’s not me, okay? I’ve been on Earth since before graduation-”

“There are radicals on Earth.” Lia says.

Chaeryeong opens her mouth to say something, but she realizes Lia’s right. _There_ are _radicals on Earth._

Taehyun cocks his head to one side, lifting both eyebrows as if to taunt Chaeryeong to go on.

Chaeryeong sighs again. “I’m really going to the bank to send money to my sister. I’ll show you guys the receipt later, if you really doubt me that much.”

Lia and Taehyun exchange uncomfortable looks.

“Th- There’s no need.” Taehyun says quickly.

“I, uh,” Lia says. “I need to go to the bank, too, actually.”

Chaeryeong watches Lia and Taehyun have a silent argument mouthing entire sentences at each other that Chaeryeong doesn’t bother to read.

“You guys wanna grab breakfast together?” Chaeryeong says gently, leaning forward to cut between them before they start silently throwing fists at each other. “I’ll wait for you.”

Taehyun purses his lips, frowning at Chaeryeong.

Lia also gives Chaeryeong a hard stare, but it only lasts for all of two seconds. She caves, giving Chaeryeong a little smile. “I know a nice café that overlooks the atrium.”

“Perfect.” Chaeryeong smiles back. “You coming with, Taehyun?”

Taehyung folds his arms. “Okay.”

Yuna wakes up to someone banging on her door. _What kind of fucking caveman…_

She beckons her holo-screen over with one hand, squinting at the video feed from the hallway outside her room. _Oh. That kind of caveman._

She drags herself out of bed, tugging a fluffy sweater over her head. _Not that_ he’d _give a shit that I’m not wearing a bra._

Yuna slides her door open. “What do you want?”

“Where is it?” Beomgyu asks.

Yuna rubs the sleep out of her eyes. “What the fuck are you talking a-”

“I know you broke into my room. How stupid do you think I am?” Beomgyu glares at her. “Give it back.”

Yuna leans on the doorframe with a sigh. “Seriously, dude-”

“Give it back. Now.”

Yuna takes a breath. She has a couple of options. She could slam the door in Beomgyu’s face, which, though the most fun of her options, won’t be very productive.

She decides to go with, “About that. We need to talk.”

Beomgyu doesn’t stop glaring at her. “I won’t-”

“It’s you, isn’t it?” Yuna asks casually, stuffing her hands into the pocket of her sweater. “You were abandoned on an asteroid.”

Beomgyu’s breaths get heavier and shallower as he keeps glowering at her.

“It was an uninhabited asteroid in the middle of fucking nowhere,” Yuna asks. “How did you get home?”

Ryujin slides her door open, not bothering to stifle a yawn.

She hears two people arguing in hushed voices, so she ducks back into her room, sliding her door closed. _Well,_ almost _closed._

“You can’t just pretend-”

“I’m not pretending anything.” Yeji says. Ryujin could recognize Yeji’s voice at any volume, through any medium, at any time, in any place. “It’s not important to me right now.” Yeji adds with a disgruntled huff.

“We only have six months left. When is it going to become important?”

_Who’s she talking to?_ Ryujin frowns. _It must be one of the guys? But who-_

“Why do you care so much?”

Ryujin’s chest hurts, more than it had when she snapped a rib. Ryujin’s injuries tended to heal over really quickly, though doctors could never figure out why.

There was just the one, that one wound that never really closed.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“And I’m moving out of the dorm.” Yeji said. “I’m going back home.”

Ryujin wanted to yell, but she didn’t know what to say. And weirdly, nothing was coming out without her thinking. Which _never_ happened with her.

“It’s better for both of us.” Yeji’s hands were curled into fists. But she wasn’t even crying. Ryujin was crying. “Trust me.”

“Please,” Ryujin echoed. “I just want to know why.”

“It’s because I’m not like you, Ryujin.”

Ryujin had tried to dry her eyes off on her sleeve, but her goddamned windbreaker was waterproof. “What do you _mean_?”

“Exactly what I mean!” Yeji raised her voice at Ryujin. She never did that. She was annoyed with Ryujin all the time, but this time, this time Ryujin’s finally done it.

_But what was it? What did I do?_

Ryujin choked on her own tears, feeling their throat seize up. “I- I- I just want to know-”

“Why do you care so much?”

Ryujin rubbed at her eyes with her hands. Yeji didn’t stop her. She looked up at Yeji, staring down at her with her face frozen in a cold, emotionless glare.

Yeji was right. She couldn’t have been clearer about it.

Ryujin had no other choice but to be honest, too.

“Because I love you, Yeji.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Yeonjun sits up in a panic, turning to the clock on his bedside table. It’s half past two in the afternoon in the ship’s internal time.

Then he remembers that they had the day off, since they’d just come back from a mission the day before. _It would’ve been something if the crew had been waiting downstairs for their captain for more than half a day._

Yeonjun grins at the idea. _Would the Admiral try to fire me? Can I even get fired from the unit?_

His gut feeling tells him that ‘fired’ is the wrong word.

He shrugs and stretches his arms above his head, frowning at the clock again. He hasn’t slept for more than six hours in a long time. The shifts at the outpost had reprogrammed his sleep schedule beyond repair.

_And yet here I am, waking up in the afternoon like a Sector 1 kid._ Yeonjun straightens the covers out, tucking the edges underneath the mattress. _But I didn’t even drink last night._

Yeonjun takes a quick shower and changes into fresh clothes, thinking about breakfast all the while. _Lunch, I guess. This waking up in the afternoon thing is weird. How_ do _the rich kids do it?_

He’s not surprised when he finds the kitchen empty. The others like to have their lunch at noon, and considering what had happened the night before, he assumes they must have all had lunch out.

Yeonjun opens the pantry, pulling out onions and garlic and whatever else he can throw together for a decent meal. He closes the pantry, noticing a silhouette behind him in the reflection on the pantry doors.

Soobin gives him a good-natured smile when he turns around. “Haven’t had lunch?”

_Breakfast._ Yeonjun shakes his head as he opens the knife drawer. “No.”

One of their knives, the big one Yeonjun likes to use for chopping, is missing.

Soobin nudges the dishwasher open with his elbow. “Oh, I forgot to take it out a while ago, sorry. It’s in here.”

“Thanks.” Yeonjun goes the long way around the kitchen island to the dishwasher. Aside from the knife, there are two sets of cutlery loaded. He takes the knife and goes the long way round again to the chopping board.

Soobin grinds some coffee beans down in relative silence.

Yeonjun’s only just cut the onion in quarters when he looks up in annoyance. Soobin’s been poking various buttons on the espresso machine, which would whine or whirr in reply, after which Soobin would panic and hit the Cancel button.

Yeonjun lowers the knife. “Where’s Beomgyu?”

“Why?” Soobin grins at him. “Do we always need to be together?”

“I was just asking.” Yeonjun says.

“I was just joking.” Soobin says.

Yeonjun picks the knife up again, then decides against it and lays it flat on the chopping board once more. He walks around the island, sighing as he presses buttons for the temperature, time, and all the other settings that he’s seen Beomgyu do probably a hundred times in the past few months.

Yeonjun takes Soobin’s violet mug and plucks Beomgyu’s bright blue one out of the cabinet to put them under the espresso machine’s spouts.

The espresso machine obediently dribbles some steaming hot espresso into the cups. Yeonjun looks up at Soobin. “Do you need me to do the milk, too?”

“O- Oh, it’s just for me.” Soobin says glancing at the blue mug. “Sorry, Beomgyu’s out-”

“Don’t worry about it.” Yeonjun mutters, pouring the contents of Beomgyu’s mug out into one of the mugs that had already been in the kitchen when they arrived. He turns away from Soobin to get the milk.

“I can do that.” Soobin offers.

Yeonjun only gives him a skeptical look while he steams the milk with one hand. He pours the frothed milk into their mugs, though it doesn’t look half as nice as when Beomgyu does it. The pattern on the surface of the foam looks less like a feather and more like a mud puddle. _Whatever. It’ll do._ He slides the violet mug to Soobin. “Here.”

“Thank you.”

Yeonjun just nods in reply, sipping from the other mug as he walks back to the onion he had abandoned.

Soobin sits down on one of the bar stools across the island from him. “What are you planning to do today?”

Yeonjun finds he can’t remember what he had been planning to cook. He frowns at Soobin. “Pardon?”

“I mean,” Soobin says, gripping the handle of his mug so tightly that Yeonjun wouldn’t be surprised if it broke. “We don’t get many days off, and all the others are out, so I was wondering what…” Soobin grimaces, nodding as if in response to Yeonjun’s cold glare. “Right. Never mind. Just trying to be friendly.”

“ _Why_?” Yeonjun scoffs before he can stop himself.

“Why not?” Soobin asks, one corner of his lips curling up in poorly disguised amusement. “It’s been so long, Yeonjun. Can’t we be friends?”

“We’re colleagues.” Yeonjun says, dicing the onion with a little bit too much enthusiasm. “Isn’t that enough?”

“Hm,” Soobin takes a sip of his cappuccino. “You aren’t friendly to your colleagues?”

Yeonjun rips the bulb of garlic in half. “I’m as friendly as I need to be.”

“Really?” Soobin’s smile makes Yeonjun’s blood boil.

“What. Do. You. Mean. By. That.” Yeonjun says, smashing a clove of garlic under the flat side of the knife after each word.

“Nothing,” Soobin says, taking another sip of coffee. He seems to realize then that Yeonjun doesn’t appreciate his company, and hops off the bar stool turning to leave.

Yeonjun lowers the knife again. “One more thing.”

Soobin stops, lifting both eyebrows. “Yeah?”

_Stop telling everyone we dated when we didn’t._

Yeonjun can’t bring himself to say it, for some reason.

“Beomgyu said something to me,” Yeonjun says instead.

“While you were being as friendly as you needed to be, yes?”

Yeonjun glares at Soobin.

“Sorry,” Soobin’s cheeks flush red. “Go on.”

_Stop telling everyone we dated._ Yeonjun tries to say it. What comes out instead is, “Be good to him.”

“He told _you_ to tell _me_ that?” Soobin says, looking like he’s seconds away from bursting out laughing. “Seriously?”

“He’s a good guy.” Yeonjun says.

“I know.”

“Good.”

“I love him.”

“You’d better.”

Soobin sighs, picking up his mug. “Are we really going to be like this forever, Yeonjun?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Fine. Unfriendly colleagues it is, then.” Soobin turns to leave, taking his mug with him. But he stops in the archway before leaving the kitchen. “Oh, ‘Beomgyu told me to tell you something’, too.”

Yeonjun’s distracted, but not so much that he wouldn’t pick up on the sheer sarcasm in Soobin’s voice. “What?”

“There’s a section in the lake in the atrium just for swimming. It’s not as nice as the lake back at the-” Soobin catches himself, his entire face flushing a deep pink. “Sorry. I’m not good at this unfriendly colleague thing. I’ll just go.”

Yeonjun frowns as Soobin’s gentle footfalls fade into the distant hallway.

“What do you think?” Chaeryeong asks, doing a little twirl in front of Lia and Taehyun.

“Buy it.” Lia says.

“Is there another color?” Taehyun grimaces.

Chaeryeong looks down at the dress she’s trying on. It’s a pretty nice shade of orange.

“ _I_ think it’s cute.” Lia says.

“Orange is a fruit,” Taehyun says. “Not a color for clothes.”

“Oh, and this, too.” Ryujin lifts a bouquet as big as her entire torso onto the counter. The postal service clerk across the counter says nothing, but her features curl into a little frown.

“Those aren’t going to make it to the Moon.”

The clerk must’ve been thinking that, but she wasn’t the one who’d said it.

Ryujin glances at the next counter. She has no choice but to roll her eyes at her own fortune. _Forty-nine other counters in this office, thousands of other postal offices in the entire_ Descant _, but of course Hwang Yeji ends up here, right?_

“They’re fake.” Ryujin says, flicking one of the roses with one finger. A real rose would’ve fallen apart from that much force, but this one just bobs its head good-naturedly, like it’s laughing at a joke.

“Oh.” Yeji purses her lips and turns back to the clerk at her counter. “Forget I said anything, then.”

Ryujin sighs. _As if I could ever._

“They’re very good imitations.” The clerk at Ryujin’s counter says. “Really had me fooled for a second there.”

Ryujin grins. “One of my buds from school runs a business out of Engineering on the 972nd floor, if you wanna order-?”

“No thank you.” The clerk says curtly, dropping the bouquet into a translucent crate already half-filled with everything else Ryujin had brought. The clerk smiles to herself while she seals the crate with glowing neon green tape. “I don’t think I know anyone who would appreciate fake flowers.”

Ryujin shifts her weight from one boot to another. _Is that a thing? Maybe that’s a thing. I don’t know, I don’t even_ like _flowers-_

“Real flowers are overrated.”

Ryujin and the clerk turn to Yeji.

“I wouldn’t want to get a gift that turns to trash in a few days.” Yeji says, just as the clerk at her counter lifts a box onto the countertop. The box’s surface is covered with a rich brocade and tied up with what seems like a silk bow. Ryujin has the feeling that the gold lettering on the bow isn’t fake.

“I for one would _love_ to get a gift like _that_ ,” The clerk at Ryujin’s counter says, eyeing the box in Yeji’s arms with hardly-veiled envy.

Yeji’s face flushes down to her neck as she unties the bow hastily. She lifts the lid of the brocade-covered box and peers inside. The clerks also lean in curiously, peeking into the box.

Ryujin tells herself that whatever Yeji got in the mail is none of her business, but she does crane her neck and look, too.

The inside of the box is lined with plush velvet, with a round velvet pillow in the center. Tied to the pillow with golden clasps is a necklace, with a filigree chain so delicate Ryujin has to squint hard just to see it. A single white pearl dangles from the middle of the chain, connected by golden threads so fine it seems to be floating.

Yeji quickly replaces the cover of the box, getting right to tying up the silk bow once more. “I’m sorry,” She says to the mystified clerk. “Can you please return it to the sender?”

The clerk only stares at her. The clerk at Ryujin’s counter leans over the divider between their two booths and squawks, “ _Why_?”

Yeji tries to ignore her, but her face has turned a deep shade of red. “I can’t accept it, please return it to the-”

“If you don’t want it, could I have it?” The clerk at Ryujin’s counter asks.

“Hey! I was here first!” The clerk at Yeji’s counter chortles, nudging the other clerk back to her own booth.

Yeji pushes the box towards them. “Please just-”

“What’s wrong with the sender? Are they ugly?” The clerk at her counter asks, grinning widely.

“Who cares what they look like if they can afford to send gifts like _that_?” The clerk at Ryujin’s counter says, which sends both clerks laughing. “Just marry them already!”

Yeji sets her jaw. She’s curled both her hands into fists, and she’s blinking more than usual.

_Whatever Yeji’s getting in the mail is none of my business, but it’s none of_ their _business, either,_ Ryujin thinks, scowling at the clerks as they gasp for breath in between laughs.

“Hey, ma’am, can I pay for my package already?” Ryujin asks, waving her hands to get the clerks’ attention.

The clerk, who couldn’t possibly be older than Ryujin, glares at her, pointing at the terminal on her counter. “Tap your fob here, _ma’am_.”

“Jeez, maybe we should’ve gone to another branch, huh, Yeji?” Ryujin says, tapping her fob against the terminal with one hand while nudging Yeji lightly with her other elbow.

“Don’t start, Ryujin.” Yeji doesn’t meet her eyes as she fills out the form to return her package to its sender. Ryujin’s not looking, of course, but she notices the address is in Sector 2.

_So it’s not her family._

Ryujin pockets her fob again, frowning at herself. _It’s none of your business._

Ryujin tells herself that again and again, but of course she and Yeji end up getting on the same elevator, and taking the last two free seats next to each other.

“So what was that about?” Ryujin asks, before she can stop herself. _Not that I do that much, anyway_.

“Don’t tell the others about it.”

Ryujin chuckles, leaning back in her seat. _Yeji has a serious problem answering questions like a normal person, doesn’t she?_

“I’m serious.” Yeji mutters, glowering at Ryujin. “Don’t tell anyone about the stupid present-”

“I wasn’t-” Ryujin starts to protest.

“Especially not Kai.”

Ryujin lifts both eyebrows. “Why? What’s with Kai?”

“I’m not asking you whom you’re sending flowers to, so can’t you grant me the same amount of privacy?” Yeji mutters, folding her arms as she turns to the clear elevator wall. They would’ve normally had a nice view of the Atrium at this altitude, but this elevator’s a bit too close to one of the _Descant_ ’s artificial waterfalls, obscuring their field of view with a fine, white fog.

Ryujin leans back in her seat, doing everything in her power not to laugh. In the gentle white light filtering into the elevator, Yeji looks lovely, like a painting from long ago that should be in one of the Sector 3 museums. _But damn is she stupid_.

“It’s for my gramps’ grave. The flowers, I mean.” Ryujin says, avoiding Yeji’s gaze, for fear that’s she’ll bust out laughing. “Mom’s been having a hard time replacing the flowers ‘cause she doesn’t live in Sector 5 anymore, so I bought some that she doesn’t need to change.”

Ryujin takes a peek at Yeji, only to find the other woman frowning at her reflection in the elevator’s dull metal floor.

Yeji blinks hard, turning to the window. “I’m sorry about your grandfather. He was- He was very kind.”

“Thanks, but it’s chill, he’s been dead for a while now.” Ryujin shrugs. “Sometimes I even forget about it.”

It’s a lie, but she knows Yeji would hate to cry in a packed elevator.

Yeji dabs the edge of her cardigan sleeve quickly against her eyes, pretending to be doing nothing more than stifling a yawn.

_See? Knew it,_ Ryujin thinks to herself. _Predictable Yeji._

Yeonjun’s lived in the _Descant_ for almost three months now, but he’s only been to four places in that time: their quarters, the ARTF’s dock, the meeting room, and the bank. Chaeryeong would invite him to go exploring with her at every free moment they got, but he declined so often that he didn’t need to bother making up excuses for her anymore. He just didn’t know how to tell her that he knew the _Descant_ ’s workings inside out, having taken an entire course taught by the teraship’s chief architect. Nothing about it seemed interesting to him anymore, except the one part that the base’s chief architect hadn’t covered in class, because his team hadn’t designed it.

Yeonjun steps out of the corridor he’s in and into the Atrium. This was the one part of the ship that the architects had no hand in, because the Admiral had insisted on so many things they couldn’t deliver. In the end, he hired his own “personal architect” to finish the job, which the architecture firm took to mean he designed it himself.

Yeonjun walks along gingerly as if he were walking barefoot on hot coals, knowing that he must look funny to the other people strolling about the rolling hills on their holiday. The grass beneath his sneakers is soft, and the dirt beneath the grass is uneven enough to make Yeonjun’s chest ache.

_This is why I never came back here._

Yeonjun passes a small family taking a picnic under the warm strip lights thousands of kilometers above.

“Stop that, Woongie,” The mother says, taking a spoon out of her smaller son’s hand. He’d been using it to dig into the dirt, making a little brown patch in the perfect green that seemed to go on forever from their view. “If you make this place ugly, the Admiral’s going to come and get you.”

Yeonjun smiles to himself. He feels she’s not entirely wrong.

He walks on until the hills begin to slope downwards, and the grass begins to thin out, slowly being replaced by warm golden sand.

“Oh, darling, it’s so beautiful! Can you take a photo of me here?”

Yeonjun goes the long way around the couple taking a photo by the glittering blue lake only a couple meters away from them now. The lake stretches out to the mountains, reaching up towards the Atrium’s ceiling in hazy purple crags.

Yeonjun takes a deep breath. The air isn’t the same strictly odorless kind everywhere else in the _Descant_. He can pick out the grass and wildflower and pine scents on the breeze. But he hates it.

He hates it all as he keeps walking, passing a sign that reads, _Swimming is allowed only until the white line_. Sure enough, he looks out to find a glowing white cord bobbing in the lake’s waves, enclosing a tiny part of the lake as far as possible from the ship’s hundreds of waterfalls.

Yeonjun gently lays his shirt, towel, and slippers on an empty beach chair by the shore.

He steps into the lake, which is comfortably cool, and he hates it. The sand beneath his feet is almost pillowy soft. He hates it, too.

Yeonjun squats to dunk his head below the surface. Then he starts swimming just below the waves in gentle strokes, making his way across the tiny cordoned-off area. He would say that he hates it, too, but he could never hate swimming.

He lifts his head above the surface to draw in some air, a smile crossing his lips briefly before he ducks under the waves again. He quickly learns that the entire area is no more than four feet deep at the deepest point, with that same soft sand underfoot all throughout. The water’s so clear that even by the glowing white line, he can still make out the shapes of the children splashing by the shore.

Yeonjun hates it so much he can’t even put it into words.

And yet he keeps going back and forth in laps along the very edge of the swimming area until the strip lights above dim to orange.

He walks up to the shore, looking at his shadow in the dimming light. It’s too short. Even on the Moon, your shadow would stretch away from you at sunset.

“Bora! It’s time to come out of the water now!” Someone calls from the distance.

Yeonjun frowns. He knows that voice. He turns slowly as he towels his hair dry, watching a little girl splashing in the dark water.

“Bora!” A man stomps down the shore, arms crossed. “You’ve been in there the entire afternoon, haven’t you had enough?”

Yeonjun nearly drops his towel on the sand. _It’s the Admiral, no doubt about it._

“No!” The little girl paddles away from the Admiral, not deeper into the water, but close along the shore.

“Bora,” The Admiral groans, stomping down the beach in pursuit. “Please, we have a dinner to get to in an hour.”

“No!” The girl giggles, chortling on some water, but that doesn’t stop her from swimming forward.

Yeonjun realizes a little too late that he’s just been standing there.

The Admiral jogs to a stop next to him. “Ah, Captain Choi. Enjoying your holiday?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good, good.” The Admiral smiles, and perhaps it’s a trick of the low light, but Yeonjun feels it’s sincere. “You deserve it.”

Yeonjun nods vaguely.

“Daddy!” The little girl shouts, splashing loudly with her hands. “I’m still here! I’m not getting out!”

The Admiral laughs. “If you’ll excuse me for a minute, my daughter likes to take advantage of the little undivided attention I can give her.”

“Of course, sir.” Yeonjun steps back while the Admiral walks down to shore, stomping like he’s pretending to be angry. _For a pantomime._

“Kim Bora, if you stay in the water any longer, you’ll become a wrinkly little raisin. Like your grandma.” The Admiral says. It takes less than a second for the little girl to practically fly out of the water, which makes the Admiral laugh, patting her on the head as she clings to his leg. “Come here, there’s someone I’d like you to meet.”

Yeonjun had been meaning to escape, but he hadn’t been able to come up with a polite enough way to do it in time.

“Yeonjun, this is my daughter, Bora,” The Admiral says, resting a hand on his daughter’s damp back. The girl gazes up warily at Yeonjun. “Bora, this is Captain Choi, one of the bravest men in the Fleet.”

_Not by my own choice,_ Yeonjun thinks. But he lowers into a squat to smile at the girl. “Hi, nice to meet you, Bora. I’m Yeonjun.”

“So you work for my Daddy?” Bora says, her face completely blank as she sizes Yeonjun up with an elevator look. Yeonjun can’t help but smile, wondering what her verdict must be.

“ _With_ , Bora, he works _with_ Daddy,” The Admiral corrects her in embarrassed whisper.

“It’s all right, sir, she’s not wrong,” Yeonjun says.

“It’s little details like that,” The Admiral says, his smile growing a little tense. “That will keep my daughter from becoming another Kim Soobin.”

Yeonjun chokes on the air, trying to disguise it as a cough.

“Ah, Bora, it seems like Captain Choi’s getting cold,” The Admiral says, his tone softening again as he wraps a towel tightly around his daughter’s shoulders. “Are you cold?”

“N- No.” Bora says, gritting her teeth to keep them from chattering.

“Really?” The Admiral lifts an eyebrow.

“I’ll g- go take a shower now.” Bora says, straightening herself up in a desperate attempt to look haughtily down the tip of her nose. _Too bad for her that she’s speaking to two grown men,_ Yeonjun thinks.

“Wear a nice dress for dinner, all right?”

“Yes, Daddy. Bye, Captain Choi.”

“Bye.” Yeonjun figures that the Admiral will leave with his daughter, but a middle-aged woman in a pale blue uniform quickly runs over to meet her, leaving him alone with the second-highest officer in the entire Fleet.

_In nothing but swimming trunks._ Yeonjun thinks, shutting his eyes in shame.

“Ah, Yeonjun, there was something I wanted to talk to you about.”

Yeonjun frowns. _Can’t this wait?_

“It’s a bit of an urgent matter.” The Admiral says, reading his expression.

Yeonjun grips his towel anxiously. “O- Of course, sir. What is it?”

“I’ve read the latest reports, of course.” The Admiral says, casting one casual glance at their surroundings, which are quickly turning to silhouettes in the deep blue twilight cast by the strip lights above. “I’ve long suspected that there was a mole in the unit, but it’s been just that for all this time: a suspicion.”

A breeze blows in from the mountains, sending a shiver down Yeonjun’s spine.

“As sad as it is to think someone might actually be sabotaging our work, I’m fairly certain someone in the unit is working for the radicals.” The Admiral’s lips curl into a smile that’s less than kind. “Or perhaps _with_ the radicals.”

Yeonjun takes a step back. He had taken a look around the Atrium when the Admiral had. There was no one around them, save for four men hidden among the trees, whom Yeonjun suspected to be the Admiral’s personal bodyguards.

“Don’t worry, there are no bugs in the Atrium.” The Admiral says. “I made sure of it.”


	29. Bugs

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“Yeonjun!”

Yeonjun heard his mom shouting at him, but he didn’t make much of it. His mom’s been pretty shouty lately, but he’s not about to blame her for it.

“Choi Yeonjun! Where are you?”

Yeonjun dipped below the surface of the pond just as he heard his mom shoving her way through the nearby shrubs.

“Choi Yeonjun if you stay in there too long, you’ll become a frog! Do you want that?”

That made Yeonjun laugh, which is a bad idea when you’re underwater. He chortled for air, thrashing about in the murky water as he searched for the surface.

“Choi Yeonjun.” One of his mom’s rough hands grabbed him by the arm, pulling him out of the pond. “Are you okay?”

Yeonjun nodded, down on all fours as he sputtered out the last of the water he’d swallowed onto the grass.

His mom patted his damp crew cut gently. “Do you want me to heat up some water for your bath?”

“No, thank you.”

Yeonjun’s mom shed her shawl, wrapping it around Yeonjun’s shoulders. “Were you able to catch anything?”

“Yes, Mama.” Yeonjun said, pushing a broad leaf off a wire mesh cage hidden by the pond’s shore. The cage was half-filled with crickets letting out confused chirps.

“Yeonjun…” His mom said, clearly trying to stifle a laugh. “This is too much _._ ”

“But you said catch a lot…?”

“You have to leave some out so there’s still more to eat tomorrow,” Yeonjun’s mom said, bending over the cage to open it. “Come on, help me let some of them go.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Ryujin punches the door’s keycode in, but steps aside so Yeji can enter the quarters first.

Yeji shoots her a look of sheer discomfort. “Ryujin, don’t-”

“YOU DON’T EVEN FUCKING KNOW ANYTHING!”

Ryujin and Yeji frown at each other, then look into the common area to find most of the other lieutenants standing around the coffee table in a tense circle.

“Yuna, please calm down,” Kai says, both hands raised in Yuna’s general direction, but she doesn’t seem remotely close to calming down anytime soon.

“I’M CALLING THE MAJOR!” Yuna yells, running for the control panel on the wall.

Chaeryeong stands in her way, arms extended. “Let’s let him explain himself first.”

“What’s going on?” Yeji asks, shedding her boots to join the rest of them in this strange standoff. Ryujin trails a safe distance behind her.

“Actually, I have no idea.” Lia says, hugging an armful of shopping bags as her eyes dart from one lieutenant to another.

Taehyun frowns at her for a moment, before turning to report to Yeji, “It appears Beomgyu’s been hiding a stash of radical tech in his roo-”

“He’s a fucking radical, Yeji.” Yuna cuts in, glaring across the room at Beomgyu, who only rolls his eyes. “He’s had me locked up in a closet _the whole day_!”

Yeji’s brows furrow as she looks at Beomgyu.

“She wouldn’t be reasonable-”

“Beomgyu.” Soobin says, tugging on Beomgyu’s sweater sleeve as warning.

Yuna glowers at him. “Of course _you’re_ just going to take his side without question!” She points a finger accusingly at Chaeryeong. “And you, too!”

“I’m not taking his side, I just want to hear whatever it is first!” Chaeryeong swats Yuna’s hand away.

“Okay, okay,” Kai says, stepping between them while he gently pushes the two women apart. “Let’s just all take a minute and take a breath-”

“Enough of your hippie bullshit!” Yuna yells, breaking out of his reach. “Why aren’t any of you taking this seriously? _He’s_ the one who’s been selling us out to the radicals-”

“For the record, no one said anything about _selling._ ” Taehyun cuts in.

“No one’s said anything that makes sense yet.” Ryujin says.

Yeji sighs at her. “Ryujin, don’t even-”

“Should we call the police?” Lia asks, crumpling the shopping bags in her arms.

“And tell them _what_?” Taehyun asks.

“I don’t know, that we found a radical?”

“You’re all fucking idiots.” Beomgyu mutters.

“Beomgyu.” Soobin says again.

“Beomgyu, I think it would be best for you to shut the fuck up for now.” Chaeryeong says sternly.

Beomgyu sucks on the inside of his cheek, but doesn’t say anything more.

Yeji looks at him closely. He doesn’t look even vaguely guilty at being caught. Her eyes naturally trail up to Soobin, who’s been standing behind Beomgyu with a deep frown on his face. _But he doesn’t look shocked. Did he know?_

“Soobin,” Yeji says. The other lieutenant looks up at her in surprise. “Surely there’s some sort of protocol in place in case something like this happens?”

“This has never happened before.” Soobin says, his voice as soft and even as ever.

“He’s not off the hook, either.” Yuna says, from behind the arm Kai’s extended to stop her from lunging over the coffee table. “They could both be radicals.”

Beomgyu lets out a loud scoff. Yuna’s looking a bit crazed with agitation right now, but Yeji doesn’t disagree with her. “Taehyun, what’s the Fleet protocol for suspected radical agents?”

Taehyun takes a deep breath.

“Don’t they take that shit to court?” Ryujin asks. “Have you got a lawyer, Beomgyu?”

“Of course the fuck not.”

“You don’t need one.” Taehyun says quietly. “Suspected radical agents don’t get court-martialed.”

Yeji shakes her head. “Then what happens to them?”

“Well, according to the records,” Taehyun swallows. “They get _interrogated_.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“It’s you, isn’t it?” Yuna asked casually, stuffing her hands into the pocket of her sweater. “You were abandoned on an asteroid.”

She wasn’t surprised to see Beomgyu’s breaths get heavier. _Hah. Got him._

“It was an uninhabited asteroid in the middle of fucking nowhere,” Yuna asked. “How did you get home?”

“That’s none of your business.” Beomgyu said, turning to leave.

Yuna reached for a drawer in her desk, unlocking it with her fingerprint. She pulled out a small red box from inside the drawer, holding it out through the doorway. “You don’t want this back?”

Beomgyu turned to her with a look that sent a shiver down Yuna’s spine. Against her will, of course.

Still, Yuna managed to hold the box just out of his reach when he tried to make a grab for it.

“Nuh-uh.” Yuna said, tossing the box into the drawer, which automatically sealed itself shut. “Answers first, then I’ll _think_ about giving it back.”

“What do you want?”

“You’re the one who’s been feeding info to the radicals, aren’t you?”

Beomgyu only glowered at her. _He can’t even lie about it._

Yuna smirked. “Well?”

“It’s not me.” Beomgyu said, but he was clearly forcing his face to stay expressionless.

“Then why do you have a closet _full_ of their stuff?”

Beomgyu let out an exasperated noise. “Why were you in my room anyway?”

Yuna straightened up, looking down at Beomgyu from the tip of her nose. “I was testing out a new scanner, and it picked up some weird shit from the room next to mine. I had to check it out, for the common good, obviously.”

“ _Obviously_.” Beomgyu echoed, rolling his eyes.

Yuna couldn’t stand Beomgyu usually, but this was pushing it, even for her. _He’s out here trying to get us all killed and he’s being_ smug _about it?_

“I’m telling the Admiral.”

That made Beomgyu’s eyes widen. “I don’t know what’s going on in that pea brain of yours, but I’m really _not_ \- Yuna! Shin Yuna! _Stop_!”

Yuna ignored him as she walked over to her terminal, quickly bringing up a message that had been sitting in her drafts for a few weeks now.

“Yuna, please.” Beomgyu said, catching on one of her hands by the wrist. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”

Yuna knew she could easily shake him off, but she lifted her hands off the keypad anyway. “Yes, I do.”

Beomgyu frowned at her.

“I know how serious this is.” Yuna said, struggling to keep her voice from cracking. “The Admiral probably won’t let you live.”

“You want me dead _that_ bad?”

“No,” Yuna said, the steadiness in her voice finally giving up on her. She blinked hard, lifting her free hand to dry her eyes on her sweater sleeve. “I don’t want anyone to die.”

Beomgyu let her wrist go. “I don’t want anyone to die, either, Yuna.”

“But you’re- you _knew_ what would happen if you did that.” Yuna stammered out, rubbing her stupid runny nose on her sleeve. “You _knew_ you were putting all of us at risk-”

“Oh my god.” Beomgyu groaned. “It’s really not me! How many times do I need to tell you-”

“How am I supposed to believe you when there’s all this evidence-”

“You _know_ me, Yuna!” Beomgyu’s shoulders sagged. “You’ve known me for _years_!”

“No, I don’t! I mean, I haven’t!” Yuna said. “You won’t even tell me how you were able to get off that asteroid-”

Beomgyu cut her off with a loud, wordless yell. Yuna stepped back warily. She’s been pissed at Beomgyu, amused at him, exhausted with him, but she’s never been _scared_ of him.

Yuna’s always hated new things.

“Fine.” Beomgyu said, sliding the door to Yuna’s room shut behind him. Yuna frowned, but didn’t move. “Fine, I’ll tell you everything.”

“Beomgyu, what-”

“I lived alone on that asteroid for ninety-three days.” Beomgyu said. Without the sunny light from the quarters’ hallway, the shadows on his face grew deeper. “Ninety-three days, no one came looking for me.”

“But-”

“Yeah, that’s not what Fleet protocol says.” Beomgyu stuck his tongue into his hollow cheek. “But they declared me dead. So no one _had_ to come looking for me, and nobody did.”

Yuna took another step away from him, feeling her back hit the door to her closet.

“I kept sending out SOS transmissions, of course.” Beomgyu said. “And I could see the nearest outpost receive them and ignore them all.”

“Beomgyu, I’m sorry-”

“The only reply I ever got was from a cargo ship. The manifest said they were carrying Earthers to a mining asteroid,” Beomgyu said, a slow smile spreading across his face. “But there was no way a cargo ship transporting Earther workers would stop to pick me up.”

Yuna frowned. “So… who…”

“Do you really have to ask?” Beomgyu chuckled. “They were radicals, Yuna.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“And then he threw me into the closet and locked it from the outside!” Yuna yells, straightening up in her seat so quickly that Kai reaches out, just in case she tries to attack Beomgyu or something.

“No, I _didn’t_. You came at me with a pair of wire clippers, so I defended myself. Obviously.” Beomgyu says. He’s sitting in the armchair opposite the couch Yuna’s on, which is as far as the others could get them from each other while still being in the same room. “Also, is this really _necessary_?”

“Would you rather we turned you over to the authorities?” Yeji asks, frowning at him.

“No, I was talking about _this,_ ” Beomgyu says, using one finger to tap the gun Ryujin’s been pointing at him for the past half hour. Beomgyu can’t even tell if it’s a stun gun or something stronger. It hadn’t been Ryujin’s idea, of course, but Yeji had suggested it. _So, naturally..._

“Don’t try your luck, she might actually shoot you, my love.”

The others shoot stern looks in Soobin’s direction, but he doesn’t look the least bit bothered. He’s just been watching Beomgyu with this deeply hurt look that’s just cracking Beomgyu up.

Beomgyu chews on his bottom lip to keep himself from laughing as he meets Soobin’s eyes. _Doesn’t feel so great being lied to, huh?_

“Beomgyu, we’re giving you a chance to explain yourself because…” Chaeryeong says, trailing off. It’s the way _she’s_ looking at him that Beomgyu can’t stand. “Because you’re our friend and we know you wouldn’t do something like that.”

“Not really.” Taehyun says. “We’ve actually got enough evidence to-”

“Let’s hear him out.” Yeji says sternly. Taehyun nods and sinks back in his seat, unconvinced. “Beomgyu?”

Beomgyu leans back in his armchair. _All in all, this isn’t so bad. I’m pretty comfortable, even if there_ is _a gun pointed at my head… Half the unit are giving me the benefit of the doubt, the other half want me dead – where the hell is Yeonjun?_

“Does anyone know where Yeonjun is?” Beomgyu asks.

“Oh yeah, where is he?” Kai asks, frowning. “Should we wait for him-”

“Don’t let him sidetrack us.” Lia says tensely, squeezing one of their throw pillows to an inch of its life between her hands.

“Yeonjun went out a while ago,” Soobin says. “He should’ve been back by now.”

“Stop! This isn’t about him.” Yuna says.

“I’ll call him.” Chaeryeong offers.

“Guys!” Yeji snaps. “Let’s focus. Beomgyu?”

Beomgyu frowns. He doesn’t know if it’s just a late reaction on his part, but he starts panicking now. _What if Yeonjun has another attack and he’s passed out somewhere and we’re all here behaving like idiots-_

“Beomgyu-”

“I think we should look for Yeonjun.” Beomgyu says.

The door slides open then, as if in response to some unheard cue.

Beomgyu twists in his seat to look at the door. He realizes a little too late that he could’ve surprised Ryujin into pulling the trigger, but he doesn’t hear or see anything from her direction, so he figures he’s safe.

“What’s going on?” Yeonjun frowns. He’s frowning, understandably, because it’s not normal to see all the lieutenants sitting around the common area without drinks – _and Ryujin’s got a gun, which also doesn’t happen all the time._ But there’s something about the way he’s carrying himself that reminds Beomgyu of the Yeonjun he’d met seven years ago.

Beomgyu slides into his seat, his shoulders collapsing with relief. _He’s fine._

“Beomgyu’s been selling us out to the radicals.” Yuna blurts out before anyone can stop her.

_Fucking Yuna._

Beomgyu twists in his seat again, opening his mouth to defend himself, but Yeonjun speaks before he does.

“Of course he isn’t.” Yeonjun says, calmly sliding out of his jacket to hang it with the others on the wall. “Where the hell did you get that idea?”

“But he-”

Yeonjun turns to Beomgyu with a grin. “How badly did you piss them off _this_ time?”

Beomgyu’s heart skips a beat. He thinks maybe Ryujin had shot him, but he lifts a hand to his chest vaguely, feeling nothing but his own heart overreacting over nothing. “I- I didn’t-”

“He’s been hiding a huge stash of radical tech in his room,” Yeji says curtly.

“That he hasn’t been able to explain.” Taehyun adds.

“We can’t just let him off the hook just because.” Chaeryeong says in a defensive tone.

Yeonjun plucks an apple out of the fruit bowl in the middle of the coffee table, rubbing it on his shirt before taking a bite. “Is that what you’re all sitting around for? You’re informally court-martialing Beomgyu?”

Lia frowns. “Would you rather we send him to the _actual_ Fleet-”

“There’s no need. He’s been stealing tech from the radical hideouts to study them, that’s all.” Yeonjun takes another bite out of his apple. “Right, Beomgyu?”

Words don’t make it out of Beomgyu’s mouth, so he just nods slowly.

“You knew about this?” Soobin asks quietly.

“Of course.” Yeonjun shrugs. “He’s not very subtle about it. He’s not subtle about anything, really. How could you think he’s the spy?”

Beomgyu’s entire face heats up.

“He makes a point. Beomgyu can’t shut up about anything.” Ryujin says, wagging the gun carelessly as she shrugs. Yeji shoots her a stern look, which makes Ryujin lower the gun self-consciously.

“So, what, we should just let him go?” Chaeryeong asks hopefully.

“No, we can’t.” Taehyun says, but he doesn’t sound too sure. He turns to Yeji, “Right?”

Yeji just furrows her brow, looking at Yeonjun as if she’s asking for help.

“We can’t just act like nothing’s going on!” Yuna shrieks, jumping out of her seat. Kai manages to catch her by the arm before she can do anything else. “He locked me up for _hours_!”

“You attacked him with wire clippers.” Soobin says.

“It’s still suspicious!”

Yeonjun lets out a sigh. “Look, whatever happens today, we’ve all got to report back to work tomorrow. Can we just enjoy the rest of our holiday without pointing deadly weapons at each other?”

The other lieutenants exchange glances with varying levels of embarrassment. Ryujin flicks the safety back on the gun, gingerly handing it back to Yeji, who nods and hides it away as quickly as she can.

“I’m sorry for locking you in the closet, Yuna.” Beomgyu mutters. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”

Kai nudges Yuna, who only scowls at him.

“Sorry for trying to kill you.” Yuna grumbles finally. “I thought I was returning the favor.”

“Oh, you’ll _know_ when I’m trying to kill you-” Beomgyu stops himself, because Yeonjun’s giving him a look that’s mildly amused, but mostly telling him to shut the fuck up. Beomgyu presses his lips together.

“So,” Yeonjun says, looking around the other lieutenants with an unusually bright smile. “Who’s taking care of dinner tonight?”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“I’ve read the latest reports, of course.” The Admiral said. “I’ve long suspected that there was a mole in the unit, but it’s been just that for all this time: a suspicion.”

A breeze blew in from the mountains, sending a shiver down Yeonjun’s spine.

“As sad as it is to think someone might actually be sabotaging our work, I’m fairly certain someone in the unit is working for the radicals.” The Admiral’s lips curled into a smile that was less than kind. “Or perhaps _with_ the radicals.”

Yeonjun took a step back.

“Don’t worry, there are no bugs in the Atrium.” The Admiral says. “I made sure of it.”

“Admiral Kim, I-”

“Listen, I _do_ have dinner to get to in a little while,” The Admiral said, glancing at the timepiece on his wrist. It was like the one Yeonjun’s grandparents had, not a hologram model, but he had the feeling there was a wide margin between the value of his grandpa’s watch and the Admiral’s. “But I’m glad I got you away from all the others.”

Yeonjun shifted his weight uneasily on his feet. He could probably take the Admiral on in hand-to-hand combat, but he was sure the second-highest ranking officer in the entire Fleet had at least a gun hidden somewhere in his light summer suit. _And there are the bodyguards,_ Yeonjun thought, glancing briefly at the shadows hovering around the nearby trees.

“I trust you, Yeonjun.”

Yeonjun couldn’t help but gape at the Admiral. “Pardon, sir?”

“It’s a relief to find someone you can trust, especially where I am.”

Yeonjun could imagine why, but he couldn’t even begin to understand what was happening.

“When I heard about your case, I just had to get you on the team,” The Admiral said, giving Yeonjun a warm enough smile, but it made Yeonjun’s back quiver. “They just don’t make people like you anymore. Not on the Moon, at least. You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone on the Moon with principles, and it gets worse the higher up you go in the sectors.”

Yeonjun decided it would be safest for him to nod, so he did.

“I’m not surprised there’s a double agent among us,” The Admiral said. “Considering the backgrounds of the others on the team.”

Yeonjun couldn’t even begin to think about whom he was talking about. _Soobin? But if you suspected him, why haven’t you gotten rid of him?_

_And how could he be a radical spy when his dad-_

“I hope I can count on you to help maintain the integrity of the unit.”

Yeonjun frowned. “W- What do you mean, sir?”

“You know what I mean, Yeonjun.”

“I don’t-” Yeonjun caught himself. “I don’t think I can find out who might be… Whom _they_ are, sir. I’m sorr-”

“You don’t want to, probably.” The Admiral said. “But I’m sure you can. And I fully expect you to.”

Yeonjun took a breath. The air was much colder than it should’ve been in a temperature-controlled environment like the base’s interior. “I’ll do my best, sir.”

The Admiral smiled. “Don’t you always?”


	30. TMI

Taehyun has had an _evening._

Yeonjun had somehow managed to get all the lieutenants to cook and have dinner together. Taehyun makes a mental note to look into the many graduate degrees on Yeonjun’s CV and see if there’s something about hypnosis there.

Taehyun can’t even remember all the mental notes he’s made in the past day alone.

_My mind is going._

_I deserve a couple years’ vacation._

_But all I’m getting is a hot bath,_ he thinks as he takes a peek into the cabinet beneath his bathroom sink. Close to a hundred bottles of bath salts look back at him despondently.

 _Maybe I should stop buying bath salts._ Taehyun frowns at some of the bottles’ labels. _I don’t remember getting this Soothing Chamomile one._

_That sounds good, though. Heaven knows I need soothing._

Taehyun hums to himself as he trades his clothes for a fluffy bath robe. He does a little dance on the safety of the bath mat before keying in his favorite bath temperature profile into a holo-screen by the side of the bathtub.

He grins giddily to himself when water starts flowing out of the faucet. _If work keeps carrying on like this, I’m going to develop an unhealthy dependency on baths._

_Can you get addicted to baths?_

Taehyun bounces excitedly in his seat at the edge of the tub, reading the label on the Soothing Chamomile bath salts.

 _The calming scent of chamomile is sure to take all the day’s worries away,_ it reads.

Taehyun scoffs. _Unless there are some memory-altering drugs mixed in here, I seriously doubt that._

He tips in some of the salts, watching them sink to the bottom of the tub. When they don’t dissolve, Taehyun frowns.

“Hey.” He says out loud, sticking a hand into the water to give it a stir. The water’s so cold it sends a shock all the way up his arm. “What the hell.”

Taehyun checks the holo-screen by the tub. There’s a warning message he hadn’t noticed earlier: _Hot water has been disabled in the unit._

Taehyun stands up, feeling lightheaded as his blood rushes through his veins in outrage. _It’s the radical spy. It_ must _be._

_HOW DARE THEY._

Taehyun secures his fluffy robe as he storms out of his room. _I don’t care if they’re a radical, I don’t care if they’ve got guns or whatever it may be, NO ONE TAKES MY BATHS AWAY FROM ME._

The hallway outside his room is dim, as it usually is at this time of night. All the other lieutenants seem to be in their rooms, unable to sleep.

_So who-_

“ _Someone’s_ feeling comfortable,” Someone says from behind Taehyun, making Taehyun nearly jump clean out of his bathrobe.

Taehyun clutches the ties of his robe, frowning as he turns around. “Beomgyu?”

“Chill out, I’m not going to stab you in the back, I’m just trying to get back to my room.”

Taehyun’s frown grows deeper as he looks at the door that had just slid shut behind Beomgyu. “What were you doing in _Yeonjun’s_ room?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.” Beomgyu breaks into a grin. He nods to the rest of the hallway behind Taehyun. “Can I pass?”

Taehyun, unable to string words together, steps aside. Beomgyu walks past him without another word and enters a room near the opposite end of the hallway. _Not his own. Soobin’s._

_What the hell is going on?_

“Looks like the holiday was too short, huh.” Major Jung says, looking over the lieutenants the next morning.

Lia barely stifles a yawn. “It was literally _one_ day, Instructor.”

Taehyun stops typing the minutes of the meeting to frown at her. _She must have really had no sleep._

“That’s _Major_ to you, don’t go time-traveling on me,” Major Jung chuckles, rolling his eyes. “Anyway, here are your assignments for-”

“Major Jung, I have a question!”

The major seems to consider his options for a moment before saying, “Yes, Yuna?”

Taehyun sighs. _That’s going to be a_ lot _more to write in the minutes._

“Is the Admiral not, you know, _kinda_ concerned about the fucking traitor among us?”

“Not this shit again, Yuna.” Beomgyu mutters.

“Yuna, we’ve been through this.” Yeonjun sighs.

Taehyun doesn’t take note of those side comments in the minutes, but he takes note in his head, hoping it sticks. _Something’s up with those two._

 _Maybe there are_ two _traitors._

_Why did we assume there was just one?_

“-no way are we going to just act like nothing’s up-” Yuna carries on, too quickly for Taehyun to keep up, if he’d been taking notes.

“It’s called being professional, Yuna.” Yeji says.

“I would like to be professionally _alive,_ thank you very much.” Yuna snaps at him.

“Hey, hey, calm down,” Soobin says. “I’m sure-”

“You know sleeping with a traitor makes you an accomplice-”

“That’s not how it works-”

“There’s no way for us to know-”

“But we _do_ know-”

Taehyun gives the major a sharp look. _How long are you going to let this carry on for?_

The major seems disinterested in doing anything about it, spinning his fob between one finger and the glass table’s surface while the lieutenants shout over and around him. He simply ducks out of the way when Ryujin takes a dive over the table, and pushes his chair backwards into safety when Beomgyu hurls the potted cactus from the center of the table.

Taehyun’s not as lucky. Somehow – because things are all happening too quickly for him to process, much less take _notes_ – Yuna’s left shoe ends up hitting his face with enough force to knock him out of his seat.

“You okay?” Chaeryeong asks, helping him off the floor.

 _Chaeryeong couldn’t be the traitor,_ Taehyun thinks, adding it to a growing pile of mental notes.

He and Chaeryeong both drop to the floor to avoid the cactus now flying to the other side of the room. _As it is, avoiding getting blown up by the radicals on a near-daily basis has done wonders for my reflexes._

The door to the meeting room opens, making the lieutenants freeze in the middle of whatever they were doing. Yuna and Beomgyu are holding fistfuls of each other’s hair while Kai and Soobin try to pull them apart, Lia’s caught between them, crouched on the floor screaming, Ryujin’s lifting a chair over her head that Yeji and Yeonjun are both trying to convince her to put down, and Taehyun and Chaeryeong are lying belly-down on the rug.

“Good morning.” The Admiral says, taking one bored glance at the lieutenants before taking a seat in the only chair not lying on its side or at risk of being thrown by Ryujin. He folds his hands in his lap before looking at the major, who’s frozen in salute. “Please continue.”

Taehyun just barely manages to pull himself together and off the floor to salute the second highest official in the entire universe. “Good morning, sir.”

The admiral just gives him a curt nod. He draws up a holo-display from what looks like a silver bracelet on his wrist, a holo-watch model Taehyun’s never seen. _Well, if you’re_ the _Admiral, I suppose you can get whatever you want._

Admiral Kim seems absorbed in whatever document he’s opened for only a few pages, before looking up to find the lieutenants sitting around the table staring back at him with a mix of anxiety and embarrassment.

“I’m sorry about… _that_ , sir.” Soobin says, standing up suddenly to give the Admiral a deep bow.

The admiral waves a hand dismissively. “I don’t care what all of you do in your free time, so long as you get the job done. And you do.”

Taehyun frowns, along with the rest of the lieutenants. _But most of our missions have been failures. Haven’t they?_

Of course he’d never say that out loud to the admiral. Taehyun likes his head firmly attached to his body.

“Admiral, sir, if I may, I have a _small_ concern.”

Taehyun turns to Lia very slowly. _Are you serious?_

“What is it?”

Lia clears her throat. “Well, you see, sir, I don’t think the team can work at full, um, efficiency at the moment because of a small, uh, because, you see-”

“I know there’s a traitor among you.” The admiral says. His gaze passes over Taehyun for just a moment, but in that split second Taehyun feels a shiver run down his spine. “Maybe more than one. I _will_ find out who you are. And you will receive the appropriate sentence.”

The admiral gives Lia a smile that’s almost sweet. “So don’t worry yourself about it, Ms. Choi. Just focus on your assignment.”

“Y- Yes, sir.”

“Major Jung, please continue. I have a meeting to get to in half an hour.” The admiral says, glancing at the vintage timepiece on his other wrist. Taehyun had noticed that before, and it hasn’t gotten any less weird. He had a photo of one of his maternal ancestors wearing something like it, back on Earth. _But no one on the Moon wears analog watches. Is the Admiral from Earth?_

Taehyun makes a mental note to find out. Surely his friends who still work in Information could find that out for him. One or two of them must still owe him a favor.

“Y-Yes sir,” Major Jung says, straightening up in his seat. “Who’s taking the minutes?”

Taehyun raises one hand while the other lieutenants drone in unison, “Taehyun.”

“You take care out there, okay?” Lia says, poking Taehyun in the arm. They’re standing the ARTF’s port, just steps away from the fork in the tunnel, leading off to the unit’s two ships. “You’re all I’ve got in this fucking place. Aside from Chaeryeong.”

“You take care, too.” Taehyun nods. _She’s not a radical. Probably._

_I should probably take note of this._

_I could probably find the traitor all on my own, just by process of elimination._

_Probably._

Chaeryeong says something to Yeonjun in the Earth dialect. With his meager understanding of the dialect, Taehyun only recognizes the word for ‘you’.

Yeonjun says something similar back to her. They don’t say anything else, but they exchange one last nervous look before going their separate ways.

_He’s not the traitor. Not Choi Yeonjun. It’s just not possible._

“I’ll go on ahead?” Yeonjun says to Taehyun, nodding to the entrance to the _Contralto_ at the end of the tunnel.

“Yes.” Taehyun nods. He decides to hang around the tunnel pretending to wait for something or someone. He’s investigating, after all.

“- _cannot_ believe you would do that in front of the Admiral.” Yeji’s voice carries down the tunnel. Taehyun ducks just out of sight as Yeji goes on, “Do you not have any shame or are you just-”

“Hey.” Ryujin cuts in. Taehyun had heard her boots on the metal floor before she’d said anything, of course. “Uh, don’t die.”

Yeji stares at her in silence for a long moment. “There’s nothing I can do about that, Ryujin.”

“Right.” Ryujin nods vaguely, her ears growing a worrying shade of pink. “Let me fix that: I _hope_ you don’t die.”

Yeji purses her lips, but she says, “I hope you don’t, either.”

“Hey Taehyun, is the ship still locked?” Kai asks.

Taehyun jumps. He hadn’t seen or heard Kai come up behind the women. Neither had they, because they also seem startled, pressing themselves against opposite walls of the tunnel.

“Holy fucking shit, are your boots made of _cotton_ , dude?” Ryujin sputters out, flattened against the tunnel wall.

“Sorry,” Kai gives her a sheepish smile. His smile goes a little lopsided when he looks at Yeji.

Yeji looks away quickly.

Taehyun notices that, of course. _But does it put them under suspicion?_

_How do the others even have the energy to keep secrets?_

“What the fuck are you all standing around here for?” Beomgyu asks, frowning at them all like they’re nothing more than cargo in his way.

“Hey. Be nice.” Soobin says, twisting the hem of Beomgyu’s shirt between two fingers.

Beomgyu pouts at him. “I’m just trying to do the thing we’re all being paid to do-”

“You guys take care, all right?” Soobin says to Taehyun and the others. His smile is warm, like it always is. _Doesn’t mean he’s not a traitor._

 _But why would he be? His dad_ is _the government._

_Maybe his relationship with his dad is strained. Maybe he’s going through a rebellious phase-_

Taehyun’s train of thought gets most rudely derailed by Beomgyu tiptoeing to kiss Soobin goodbye. With tongue.

_UGH._

Taehyun leans back in his seat, watching the dot representing the _Contralto_ travel along the map on his screen. There’s not much for him to do at the moment, as the warp timer still has over three days left on it. Beomgyu’s just dimmed the dome around the bridge to block out most of the flashing lights from the warp.

_Time to get back to the real work, then._

Taehyun closes his eyes, drawing up a chart in his mind.

 _ARTF Members,_ he types in the center. He draws ten lines radiating out from that, putting a picture of each lieutenant at the end of each line.

He’s just drawn an X over his mental image of his own face when he hears Ryujin yell out,

“Hey Captain! Taehyun’s sleeping!”

Taehyun opens his eyes. “I was _not_ -”

“Why’d you wake him up? We could’ve drawn on his face.” Beomgyu says, lifting a marker that Taehyun feels was never intended for human skin.

“You can go to the sleeping quarters if you’re feeling tired,” Kai suggests.

“Yes, while we’re still in warp,” Yeonjun says.

Taehyun narrows his eyes at them both. They’re giving him friendly-enough smiles, but he’s not about to let his guard down.

_But if I’m alone in the sleeping quarters, I can access the database without them seeing._

Taehyun lets out what he hopes is a convincing yawn. He even stretches his arms over his head. “Thanks. I really didn’t get _any_ sleep last night.”

“Who did?” Beomgyu scoffs. “I’m sure I didn’t.”

“That’s your own fault, you slut,” Ryujin laughs, extending one leg to kick Beomgyu’s chair and send him spinning.

“Ryujin, please, the Admiral _does_ get recordings of everything we say in the ship.” Yeonjun sighs.

Taehyun hesitates on his way out of the _Contralto’s_ bridge. _He’s right, of course. The Admiral sees and hears everything we do in the ship. So how could he not know who the spy is yet?_

“Oh hey, Taehyun, could you please charge my watch while you’re there?” Kai asks.

Taehyun turns with both eyebrows raised. “Oh, sure.”

He watches in horror as Kai slips his holo-watch off, balling it up in one fist as he gets ready to throw it. “Here, catch!”

_No, don’t-_

Taehyun can do nothing but listen as the watch flies clean over his head and bounces down the stairwell just outside the bridge, the sad, metallic noise accompanied by the hacking laughter of Ryujin and Beomgyu.

He quickly updates the diagram in his mind.

_Shin Ryujin & Choi Beomgyu – may or may not be traitors, but are definitely bitches_

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Taehyun has always been, by nature, an inquisitive person. He could never decide whether to chalk it up to nature or nurture. He’s the eighth Kang Taehyun in a family of inquisitive people. Kang Taehyun the first was a Chief Information Officer under the first General, and his son, Kang Taehyun the second, served as the first Minister of the newly-inaugurated Data Filtering Board. The third, fourth, and fifth Kang Taehyuns occupied the same position, passing on the title of Minister like a baton in a relay race. Taehyun’s grandfather, Kang Taehyun the sixth, had been the first Minister of the newly-renamed Information Board. He passed the title along to _his_ son, Kang Taehyun the seventh, shortly before Taehyun’s birth.

Taehyun was five years old when he was first allowed to go with his father to work. The Information Board’s main office was a large gray obelisk of a building with no windows. It sat awkwardly between two glassy buildings in a broad Sector 3 avenue, looking like it was the only building in the row that hadn’t read the invite and thought it was going to a costume party.

Taehyun, being an inquisitive five-year-old, looked out the window of his father’s stretch hovercar and promptly asked, “Father, why are there no windows?”

“To protect the data housed inside.”

“Protect it from who?”

“It’s ‘Protect it from _whom_?’, son.”

“Oh. Sorry.” Taehyun sat up straighter in his booster seat. “ _Whom_ are you protecting the data against?”

Taehyun’s father sighed. But Taehyun must have been looking at him so eagerly, with his giant eyes that glowed like Jupiter over the horizon.

“There’s too much data in this universe for people to process,” Taehyun’s father said. “So we in the Information Board filter through the data for the public, so that the public can access information in easily digestible portions.”

Taehyun frowned for a moment, just as the hovercar entered a ramp into the building’s basement parking. “Like my cutlery?”

Taehyun’s father had been looking at something outside the window that Taehyun couldn’t see. “Hm?”

“It’s like my cutlery, they’re smaller than yours because my mouth is small.” Taehyun said.

Taehyun’s father smiled at him. “Yes, Taehyun, just like that.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Taehyun rubs his eyes. He’s beginning to realize that he’s more than a bit sleepy, and that he’s getting nowhere. He can’t find any files on the Admiral at his lieutenant-level clearance that tells him something he didn’t already know before.

 _God damn the Archives._ The Fleet’s Archive Department had always been at odds with Taehyun’s family, being nothing more than a poor imitation of the State Information Board, so he wouldn’t be surprised if they had seen his name and put extra restrictions on his account.

_But it’s not the Admiral anyway. He’s already risking his neck running an unauthorized operation like this, why would he undermine it?_

_It must be one of us._

Taehyun glances at the door of the sleeping quarters for a moment, then opens up an encrypted folder on his holowatch. He’s adjusted the settings so that the screen is only visible through the corrective lenses implanted in his eyes. Even if one of the others _were_ to walk in, they would’ve seen Taehyun doing nothing more than reading a comms textbook to put himself to sleep.

The display that only Taehyun could see had nine sub-folders, one for each of the other lieutenants. Taehyun had started collecting information on the others months ago, but he’d gotten too busy trying to stay alive to take it up again.

_Well, it’s got everything to do with me staying alive now._

Taehyun opens one of the summaries he’d created all those months ago, drawing up a few more tabs to find more things to add to each.

  1. _Choi Beomgyu_
    * _BS Chemistry – Sector 3 Community College (2214)_
    * _Fleet Engineer Diploma & License – State Fleet Academy (2217)_
    * _PhD in Materials Engineering – State Fleet Academy (2223)_
    * _Junior Engineer,_ EXP Fermata _(2217-2219)_
    * _I.A. – 3 months (2219)_
      * _Comment: Look into this_
      * _Comment: No data available_
    * _Requested transfer to R &D dept citing “desire to pursue graduate studies” (2219)_
      * _Comment: Very suspect. Beomgyu hates any kind of studies._
    * _EFB Descant R &D Dept (2219-2224)_



Taehyun adds a few more lines to the file.

  * **_Large stash of radical tech – questionable_**
  * **_Relationship with Kim Soobin – questionable_**
  * **_Ethics – questionable_**
  * **_Likely to be a spy – monitor closely_**



****

  1. _Kim Soobin_
    * _BS Astronautical Engineering – Lunar University (2214)_
    * _Fleet Captain Diploma & Piloting License – State Fleet Academy (2217)_
    * _Archivist, Fleet Archive Department (2217-2224)_
      * _Comment: Seems to have transferred to the ARTF some time before 2224_
      * _Comment: How?_
      * _Comment: What is the Rank 1 captain doing in a relatively low position in the Archives?_
      * _Comment: Any position in the Archives is low._
    * **_Working in the ARTF – secret from the General (father)_**
    * **_Possibly strained relationship with said father_**
    * **_Unexplainable attachment to Choi Beomgyu – perhaps both are working for the radicals_**
    * **_Monitor closely_**



****

  1. _Hwang Yeji_
    * _BS Astronautical Engineering – Lunar University (2214)_
    * _Fleet Pilot Diploma & Piloting License – State Fleet Academy (2217)_
    * _Secondary Pilot,_ EXP Guisto _(2217-2218)_
    * _Primary Pilot,_ EXP Guisto _(2218-2219)_
    * _Secondary Captain,_ EXP Obbligato _(2219-2224)_
      * _Comment: By Special Promotion, signed off by Colonel Yang (her uncle?)_
      * _Comment: Confirmed, Colonel Yang is her uncle & son of the late General Yang (her grandmother)_
      * _Comment: Yikes_
    * **_May be trying to overthrow the current administration so the Yang clan may assume power once more?_**
    * **_Using the radicals for that is a brilliant idea. Terrible, but brilliant._**
    * **_Monitor closely_**



__

  1. _Choi Lia_
    * _BS Navigational Science – Jovian Women’s University (2214)_
    * _Fleet Navigation & Communications Diploma & License – State Fleet Academy (2217)_
    * _Communications Officer,_ EXP Cantabile _(2217-2219)_
    * _Communications Officer – Communications Department,_ EFB Descant _(2219-2224)_
    * **_Poor fashion sense_**
    * **_Owns shares in the gelateria on the 5 th floor of the Atrium – gets large discounts, remember to bring her along when craving ice cream_**
    * **_Oversharer and bad liar_**
    * **_Would not enlist as a spy even if she were the last person left in the universe. Not that one would need espionage if there were no other people in the universe._**
    * **_Not likely to be a spy_**



__

  1. _Lee Chaeryeong_
    * _BS Pre-Medicine – Dome 22 Local University (2214)_
      * _Comment: I didn’t know they had Pre-Med programs on Earth_
      * **_Comment: My own ignorance is astounding_**
    * _Doctor of Medicine – State Fleet Academy & Lunar General Hospital (2217)_
    * _Did not join the Fleet after graduation - Private practice in Dome 22? (2217-2224)_
      * _Comment: I assume so_
      * **_Comment: Confirmed. Ran the Lee Family Clinic on General Soo Road, Dome 22._**
    * **_Terrific listener_**
    * **_~~Not likely to be a spy~~_**
    * **_Seems to have been implicated in a Dome 22 police report from earlier this year? (2224)_**
      * **_Comment: [Attached file]_**
      * **_Comment: Why would she interrupt the raid of a radical hideout?_**
      * **_Comment: Ask her about this once we return from this mission. I’m sure it was a misunderstanding._**



  1. _Shin Yuna_
    * _BS Computational Engineering, minor in Accounting – Lunar University (2214)_
    * _Fleet Engineer Diploma & License – State Fleet Academy (2217)_
    * _Junior Engineer,_ EXP Fortissimo _(2217-2219)_
    * _Junior Engineer,_ EXP Guerriero _(2219-2223)_
    * _Senior Engineer,_ EXP Guerriero _(2223-2224)_
    * **_Too noisy about the traitor to actually be the traitor_**
      * **_Comment: Unless it’s some masterful misdirection_**
      * **_Comment: No, the traitor wouldn’t draw so much attention to the issue_**
    * **_Just noisy – not likely to be a spy_**



****

  1. _Choi Yeonjun_
    * _BS Mechanical Engineering – Dome 51 Local University (2214)_
      * _Comment: Not his home dome. He’s from Dome 88 (no university, assigned agricultural dome status)_
    * _Fleet Captain Diploma & Piloting License – State Fleet Academy (2217)_
    * _MS Navigations & Communications – State Fleet Academy Online University (2219)_
    * _MS Astronautical Engineering – State Fleet Academy Online University (2220)_
    * _MS Astromotive Engineering – State Fleet Academy Online University (2221)_
    * _MS Astronautical Architecture – State Fleet Academy Online University (2222)_
    * _MS Systems Engineering – State Fleet Academy Online University (2223)_
    * _MS Criminal Justice – State Fleet Academy Online University (not completed, 80% of units accomplished)_
      * _Comment: What is wrong with him?_
      * **_Comment: It must have been very boring in that outpost._**
    * _Ranger, Fleet Outpost FPO-4417 (2217-2219)_
    * _Ranger Captain, Fleet Outpost FPO-4417 (2219-2224)_
      * _Comment: Why was he not shuffled in 2219?_
      * _Comment: How did the Rank 3 of the captain program end up in the lowest outpost?_
      * _Comment: Look into this._
      * **_Comment: Not cleared for captaincy on grounds of psychological evaluation_**
      * **_Comment: [Attached file]_**
    * **_Has taken no leaves/vacations (holidays included) from 2217-2224_**
      * **_Comment: [Attached File]_**
      * **_Comment: Worrying behavior, but not suspicious_**
    * **_Given special commendation for the rescue of several State citizens from radicals (2224)_**
      * **_Comment: Why didn’t he tell us about this?_**
      * **_Comment: He’s very humble, I suppose_**
    * **_Not likely to be a spy_** ** _– monitor for his own good_**



****

  1. _Shin Ryujin_
    * _BS Accountancy – Sector 3 Community College (2214)_
    * _Fleet Pilot Diploma & Piloting License – State Fleet Academy (2217)_
    * _Secondary Pilot,_ EXP Mesto _(2217-2219)_
    * _Secondary Pilot,_ EXP Pizzicato _(2219-2224)_
    * **_Filed for resignation from the Fleet but didn’t finish filing her papers (2224)_**
      * **_Comment: [Attached file]_**
      * **_Comment: Why?_**
    * **_Vocal about dislike towards the Fleet – maybe enough to turn to the radicals’ side?_**
      * **_Comment: Does not possess the discretion necessary to be a spy_**
      * **_Comment: Does not possess any discretion whatsoever_**
    * **_Not likely to be a spy_**



**__ **

  1. _Jung Kai_
    * _BS Pre-Medicine – Lunar University (2214)_
    * _Doctor of Medicine – State Fleet Academy & Lunar General Hospital (2217)_
    * _Junior Medical Officer,_ EXP Obbligato _(2217-2219)_
    * _Junior Medical Officer,_ EXP Glissando _(2219-2223)_
    * _Senior Medical Officer,_ EXP Glissando _(2223-2224)_
    * **_Honestly quite bland_**



Taehyun stares at his file, struggling to keep his eyes open. His database search on Kai on the other tab is just showing his surgery records in the _Obbligato_ and _Glissando_ and his family’s fruit and mining corporation. _Strange combination._ Taehyun yawns.

_Well, I’ve cut it down to three… or four… suspects-_

The door slides open suddenly, making Taehyun jump in his bed and close his holowatch display.

“Oh, sorry, did I wake you up?” Kai tiptoes into the sleeping quarters, closing the door gently behind him.

Taehyun blinks as his eyes adjust to the relative darkness once more. “No, I wasn’t sleeping.”

“Having trouble…?” Kai stops midsentence, frowning at his watch as he picks it up off the charging pad. A series of notifications jump up at his touch, cascading over one another so quickly Taehyun can’t read them. Kai seems to cast a quick glance in Taehyun’s direction before turning his back to him, blocking any view Taehyun might have had of his holowatch screen.

Taehyun rolls onto his side as casually as he can, pretending to close his eyes.

Kai doesn’t move for a long time. _He must be typing a_ very _long message._

 _To_ whom _?_

“Is something the matter?” Taehyun asks.

“Wha- Oh, nothing,” Kai lets out an uneasy chuckle. He turns partway to give Taehyun a small smile, lit from below by the glow of his holowatch screen. Then he turns away again before Taehyun can read a single word on the screen. “It’s um, my… mom. Being a mom, you know.”

Taehyun _does_ know, but his mom can’t contact him when he’s away on missions. Because Major Jung had Taehyun and Lia install scramblers in both ships to stop any incoming messages that might interfere with the mission.

“You should try to get some rest.” Kai says. “Since we’re going to be running for our lives again in a couple of days.”

“Assuming the traitor gives us enough time to run.”

“Oh, Taehyun,” Kai says, locking his watch and placing it back onto the charging dock. He straightens his pants out as he makes his way to the door. “We don’t even know if they’re real. For all we know it’s just some thing the radicals want us to think so we can’t get a good night’s sleep.”

Taehyun gives up on pretending to sleep. He frowns at Kai, who’s just pulled the door to the sleeping quarters open.

“Stop worrying about it, Taehyun.” Kai says, silhouetted against the light from the hallway. “I know it’s easier said than done, but the sooner we stop worrying about the _boogieman_ , the better it is for all of us. Right?”

“Yeah.”

“Night, Taehyun. Hope you can get some sleep.”

Kai closes the door behind him.

Taehyun opens his eyes when he’s sure he’s alone. He looks at Kai’s watch on the charging pad, the notification light at the side of it glowing a faint teal.

 _His_ mom’s _sending him messages? My ass._

Then he unlocks his own holo-watch, quickly adding to his file,

  1. _Jung Kai_


  * _BS Pre-Medicine – Lunar University (2214)_
  * _Doctor of Medicine – State Fleet Academy & Lunar General Hospital (2217)_
  * _Junior Medical Officer,_ EXP Obbligato _(2217-2219)_
  * _Junior Medical Officer,_ EXP Glissando _(2219-2223)_
  * _Senior Medical Officer,_ EXP Glissando _(2223-2224)_
  * **_~~Honestly quite bland~~_** ~~~~
  * **_Always first to suggest we ignore the traitor altogether – very suspicious behavior_**
  * **_MANAGES TO GET TEXTS PAST THE SIGNAL SCRAMBLERS – HOW? AND FROM WHOM?_**
  * **_MONITOR VERY CLOSELY_**



“How are you feeling?” Yeonjun asks Taehyun as soon as the latter steps back into the bridge.

“Fine.” Taehyun says. “I mean, better. I’m better. Thanks.”

“Good,” Yeonjun gives Taehyun a warm smile.

Taehyun’s just lowered himself into his seat when he catches a glimpse of Kai out of the corner of his eye. He swivels his seat around. “Actually, Yeonjun, could I speak to you for a moment?”

Yeonjun checks the warp timer before smiling at Taehyun again. “Sure.”

Ryujin and Beomgyu exchange looks as Taehyun passes them, but Taehyun can’t quite figure out what they mean. _Those two are always giving each other weird looks._

_Does that make them suspects?_

“What’s up?” Yeonjun asks, once the door to the common area shuts behind them.

“I’ve been doing a little investigation on my own-” Taehyun starts, but the sudden shift in Yeonjun’s expression surprises him. “About the traitor, I mean.”

Yeonjun is silent for some time, but he eventually asks, “What did you find?”

“Nothing. A lot of things, actually, but nothing of substance,” Taehyun sighs. Then he straightens himself up to full height, frowning at Yeonjun. “Do you know about the signal scramblers?”

“The ones the radicals have?”

“No,” Taehyun says. “The ones that Major Jung had me and Lia install on the ships.”

Yeonjun looks troubled. “No, I’m afraid I don’t.”

“Well, he had us install them to block any transmissions over State-controlled lines, like from the Moon or from the _Descant,_ ” Taehyun says. “From our families and friends. So they don’t interfere with our missions.”

“Oh.” Yeonjun scratches behind one ear. “I guess I don’t send out enough transmissions to notice.”

“It’s also to stop the radical spy from sending out messages, while we’re on the mission at least.”

Yeonjun nods. “It should work.”

“Yes, it should. We configured it for the frequency range used by all public lines, even those of most secured Fleet lines, except for the Major’s, the Admiral’s, and the database.” Taehyun says, glad that Yeonjun’s eyes light up with understanding, so he doesn’t have to explain further. “But someone on this ship has been able to send messages past it.”

Taehyun expects Yeonjun to ask whom, but Yeonjun only asks, “So they’re not using any State-controlled line, public or Fleet?”

“No.”

“Then it could be a private line.” Yeonjun says. “Right?”

“Yes, but…” Taehyun hadn’t thought of that. He shakes his head. “Those are ridiculously expensive, Yeonjun.”

“Some of the people here may be able to afford it,” Yeonjun says, with a pointed look at Taehyun.

“My family doesn’t have one.” Taehyun says defensively. “Why would Kai’s? They’re not even _that_ rich, and they’re new rich on top of that, I doubt they’d have a long-standing private family line-”

Taehyun catches himself, shutting his eyes in shame. _I sound like my mother._

“We’d better ask him about it, still,” Yeonjun says quietly. His expression is blank enough, but his fists had curled to his sides without Taehyun noticing.

“He’ll only deny it.”

“Of course,” Yeonjun says. “But all of us deserve at least that much, don’t you think, Taehyun?”

Taehyun lowers his head, nodding.

“We’d better get back to the bridge.” Yeonjun’s hands unfurl at his sides as an easygoing smile spreads across his lips again. “Before the others start suspecting _us_.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“What’s that?”

“Nothing.” Taehyun quickly swiped the notification on his holo-watch away, but he hadn’t been fast enough. Chaeryeong and Lia raised their eyebrows at him, arms folded while they waited for Chaeryeong’s payment on her new dress to come through.

“Is the Major also calling you in?” Lia asked.

“For what?” Chaeryeong blinked at them in surprise. “We’re on vacation!”

Taehyun looked around the mid-level department store they’d spent the better part of the afternoon in, which smelled a worryingly lot like plastic. He looked at the bright yellow dress Chaeryeong had put in the self-checkout bin, which also reeked of molten plastic. The shopping bags dangling from Taehyun and Lia’s arms seemed, at first glance to be made of paper, but smelled suspiciously like they weren’t. _Not exactly what I’d call a vacation…_

“He wants some upgrade installed on the ships before the mission tomorrow.” Lia explained. She nudged Taehyun with one elbow. “Are we just gonna ignore him?”

“Of course not.” Taehyun said. “It must be important, if he’s calling us in on our holiday.”

Lia sighed.

“I’ll bring all the stuff we bought upstairs,” Chaeryeong said, reaching out to take Taehyun and Lia’s bags from them.

“No, no-”

“It’s a lot-”

“Really, it’s fine, I can carry them all,” Chaeryeong insisted, pulling Taehyun’s shopping away from him with more force than he could reasonably contest with. “Go see what Major Jung wants.”

“Not much, hopefully,” Lia said. “I mean, we just installed the latest upgrades to the comms systems two weeks ago.”

Taehyun wrinkled his nose at a sudden gust of stale air from the department store’s ventilation system. “It’s probably something to do with the scanners.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“Exiting warp in T minus 5 minutes.” Taehyun says, trying to type something into his station, but his palms are slick with sweat. _As they have been, for the past three days._

He doesn’t know why Yeonjun’s taken this long to do anything about Kai – why he’s not done anything at all, after all this time.

“Uh, starting warp generator cooldown sequence,” Beomgyu says, flicking the button on his holo-screen. “Unless I should leave it on standby?”

“No, we’re not expecting any trouble. Intel says this hideout’s been deserted for years. Ryujin, the engine?” Yeonjun asks, leaning back in his seat with that calm expression that’s driving Taehyun insane.

“Engine’s warming up.” Ryujin says, flexing her fingers over her controls. “Two minutes.”

“Taehyun, where are we expecting to exit warp at?”

“I’ve pinned our exit point behind a neighboring asteroid, A248-9857U. It’s rich in iron, just in case someone on asteroid 0325-KZ tries to run a scan.” Taehyun says, frowning at Yeonjun. He glances at Kai, who’s drumming his fingers on his armrests with nothing to do. _Why don’t you do anything about him, Yeonjun? Must I?_

 _What would_ I _even do?_

“But if we’re behind an iron-rich asteroid, won’t it interfere with _our_ scans?” Kai asks, looking up suddenly. Taehyun looks away quickly.

“We’ll have to drive around it before I can run initial scans.” Taehyun says.

“You mean _I’ll_ have to drive around it,” Ryujin snorts.

“We _do_ have EM cloaking on, in case there _is_ someone on 0315-KZ waiting for us.” Beomgyu says.

“0325-KZ.” Taehyun corrects him.

“Whatever.”

“Beomgyu.” Yeonjun says sternly.

Beomgyu tenses up in his seat, turning to Taehyun to mutter a brief, “Sorry.”

Taehyun frowns. He’s never seen Soobin manage to make Beomgyu apologize.

He briefly remembers Beomgyu the night before, holding a cardigan close around his shoulders and giving him that irritating smile. _“Wouldn’t you like to know?”_

Taehyun looks back at Yeonjun. _They can’t be._

The streaks of light from the warp tunnel fade to darkness, as the pinpricks of stars twinkle into view at the periphery as Beomgyu raises the brightness of their dome. Directly in front of the ship, blocking almost as all of its view is a dark, dull grayish object like a misshapen egg, the asteroid A248-9857U.

“All right, Ryujin, please get us around this asteroid,” Yeonjun says. “Taehyun, run the scan as soon as we make it around to the side.”

“Yes, sir.” Taehyun says. “I mean, Yeonjun.”

“Yes, _sir!_ ” Ryujin snickers as she grips the semicircular handles of her controls, easing the _Contralto_ into a graceful arc around the asteroid so smooth they hardly shift in their seats.

Taehyun frowns as he lines up the scan parameters on his screen, finger hovering over the button labeled, _Run._

More stars come into their view as they come around the side of the asteroid, glowing urgent yellows and reds like distant sirens. A dark object, like a floating shadow enters the corner of their field of vision. A white label hovers above it on their dashboard: _Asteroid 0325-KZ._

Ryujin pulls back on the thrusters, slowing the ship to cling somewhat to the side of the asteroid they’d been hiding behind.

Taehyun’s gripped by an uneasy feeling when he hits the _Run_ button. A small window pops up on his holo-screen to show him the progress of the scan, the darkened bar filling up with white as each second passes. In another window, a rough 3D rendering of the space around them is being etched into shape, as if by a very bad sculptor.

_Scan complete._

“Taehyun, report,” Yeonjun says as soon as the message appears on Taehyun’s holo-screen.

“Um…” Taehyun uses one finger to scroll through the scan report, glancing back at the 3D model every so often. “The asteroid seems to have hollow chambers running uh, 600 meters deep at the lowest point, consistent with the intel.”

“Less than a kilometer?” Beomgyu heaves a sigh of relief. “Yeah, our explosives should be able to handle that.”

“And it’s deserted?” Yeonjun asks Taehyun.

“Yes.” Taehyun says, using both hands to zoom in on the 3D rendering. “Yes, it’s-”

“What’s that?” Kai asks, pointing at Taehyun’s display from clear across the bridge.

Taehyun frowns at him. “What?”

“There’s an orangey thing,” Beomgyu says, pointing at the scan results. Sure enough, there’s a speck of an orange glow near the surface of one of the asteroid’s many underground spaces.

“It’s a person.” Yeonjun says, gripping his armrests.

Kai sits up in his seat. “We can’t continue with the mission if there’s a person-”

“I’ll run the scan again.” Taehyun says, not bothering to change the parameters. He hits the _Run_ button again.

“Should I slow down?” Ryujin asks.

“No, we’ll carry on with the landing.” Yeonjun says. “If it’s only one person-”

“They’re gone.” Taehyun says, tossing the results of his new scan to a corner of the _Contralto’s_ semispherical windshield. The small orange glow has vanished, leaving the 3D rendering a sea of blues and purples.

“As in, they _died_?” Ryujin makes a face.

“Could they just be hiding?” Kai asks.

“No, there’s no way to hide from these latest Fleet scanners.” Beomgyu says.

“It’ll find any person every several kilometers beneath the surface.” Taehyun adds.

Ryujin lifts both eyebrows. “Could it be an animal? Or an alien?”

“The signature seems to be consistent with a human.” Taehyun shakes his head as he frowns at the previous scan result details. _It’s human, definitely, but something’s off…_

Taehyun’s heart skips a beat.

“They don’t have a State tracker.” He says.

“What does that mean?”

“What else could it mean?”

“Run the scan again, Taehyun.” Yeonjun says.

Taehyun does so even before Yeonjun finishes his sentence. They sit there in a tense silence, with even Ryujin looking away from her controls every now and then to watch the progress of the scan on Taehyun’s display.

_Scan complete._

“They’re there again.” Kai says, just as Taehyun zooms into the 3D rendering.

The orange glow is brighter now, closer to the surface.

Taehyun frowns at it. _It doesn’t make sense. These scans don’t make mistakes._

_Is it really a person?_

Kai swivels in his seat to face Yeonjun. “We can’t continue with this mission.”

Taehyun frowns at him. “We can’t just abandon the mission. The Admiral expects-”

“We’ll carry on with a slight change of plans.” Yeonjun says, cutting him off. “Only Ryujin and I will go onto asteroid to set up the explosives. The three of you remain on the ship.”

“But-” Kai frowns.

“But we will hold on the detonation until we confirm that the base is empty.” Yeonjun says.

Ryujin turns away from her controls with a horrified look. “We’re going to _kill_ them?”

Yeonjun scowls at her. “No, we’re going to find them, and then-”

“If they’re a radical, they’ll try to kill _you_ , so you’ll be forced to defend yourselves. Or you’ll just get killed.” Beomgyu says. “And if we take them prisoner, the Admiral will have them killed as soon as we land.”

Yeonjun grips the ends of his armrests so tightly his knuckles turn white. “Then what do you suggest?”

“Drop the explosives, drive away, set them off.” Beomgyu says.

The bridge falls silent.

“I’m not going to do that.” Yeonjun says, in a tone that leaves no room for argument.

“Isn’t it better for them to die that way, than at your hands,” Beomgyu says. “Or the Admiral’s?”

“No.” Yeonjun’s staring Beomgyu down. “Never suggest anything like that again, Engineer Choi.”

“There’s going to be blood either way, Captain.” Beomgyu says.

Taehyun can’t understand how Beomgyu could possibly not know to back down, right now. Beomgyu’s gaze softens, even though Yeonjun looks ready to shoot him on the spot.

“But it doesn’t have to be on you.” Beomgyu says.

Yeonjun clears his throat. “Taehyun.”

Taehyun jumps in his seat. “Yes, sir?”

“Find us a place to land on the asteroid near that… person. Coordinate with Ryujin and Beomgyu for the landing protocol.” Yeonjun turns to Kai then. “Kai, what’s the strongest tranquilizer we have?”

“Eurydicine.” Kai replies promptly.

“Load it as alternate ammo on two stun guns, one each for me and Ryujin.” Yeonjun says. “Any questions?”

The other lieutenants shake their heads silently.

“Good.” Yeonjun leans back in his seat, his back still ruler-straight. He takes a shallow breath. “Good.”

All the others turn back to their stations except Beomgyu, who stays frowning up at their captain.

“Beomgyu, the landing protocol.” Yeonjun says, avoiding his gaze.

“Yes, sir.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“May I come in?”

The door slid open before Beomgyu can knock again. Beomgyu gripped the edges of his cardigan, stepping in gently, as if he were walking on thin ice. He’d never felt strange about entering other people’s rooms before – he’d had close to ten years’ practice sneaking in and out of them, really – but for some reason, this just felt wrong to him.

Yeonjun had been reading something on his holo-display, which he promptly shut down. “Is something the matter?”

Beomgyu opened his mouth, but the words didn’t come right away, which was also unusual for him. It was usually a struggle to keep the words from flooding out.

“No, I just wanted to say thanks.” Beomgyu said. “For getting them off my case.”

Yeonjun didn’t smile. “I did it for the entire team.”

“But you believed me, when all those other bitches-”

“I don’t.” Yeonjun said. “I only said all that to de-escalate the situation.”

Beomgyu frowned. “You _don’t_ believe me?”

Yeonjun folded his arms. “Why should I?”

“Because- Because you know me, Yeonjun,” Beomgyu’s brow furrowed in frustration. “You know I wouldn’t do something like that.”

“I don’t. It’s been years, Beomgyu. You can’t ignore that.” 

“Is it because I was stuck on that asteroid? I’ll tell you all about that, all you have to do is ask,” Beomgyu said, his throat beginning to burn. _Oh no._ “All you ever have to do is ask me, Yeonjun.”

Yeonjun looked up, into Beomgyu’s eyes, and for some reason, it was just too much for Beomgyu at the moment. Beomgyu looked down at his feet.

“If I just ask you, you’ll just deny it all.” Yeonjun said slowly, walking towards Beomgyu. “I’ll never know if you’re telling the truth-”

“But I _am_ -”

“Why did you hide all of those things from us?” Yeonjun asked, stopping an arm’s length away from Beomgyu. “I only caught you doing it the first time, but the others make it sound as if you’ve accumulated a-”

“It’s not that much.” Beomgyu took a step backward. “And why do I have to tell you about it, when you clearly figured it out anyway? Besides, the Admiral already-”

“He already warned you. And you still did it. You don’t want to get on his bad side-”

“I’m just trying to find out more about them, same as everyone else here,” Beomgyu said. “Except whoever’s on _their_ side.”

Yeonjun put his hands down to his sides.

“Does it make sense, fighting an enemy we know almost nothing about?” Beomgyu asked. “We know they can make dead spaces for comms, shut down our engines remotely, even in warp, but we don’t know how. How the hell are we supposed to win against them?”

The lights in the room seemed to dim then, as though the dark expanse outside Yeonjun’s window were swallowing them up.

It was a long time, or perhaps it wasn’t but certainly felt like it, before Yeonjun looked up at Beomgyu again. “I wish I didn’t know you.”

Beomgyu frowned at him. “What?”

“I wish I didn’t know you,” Yeonjun said, his expression growing sad. “Then I could be more impartial. Then I wouldn’t be inclined to agree with you. And let you off the hook when I probably shouldn’t.”

Beomgyu’s chest tightened. “Yeonjun-”

“If you _are_ working for them, just tell me. Please. Just tell me.”

Beomgyu made the mistake of looking up into Yeonjun’s eyes again. They’re nothing like Soobin’s eyes, not nearly as distractingly pretty, but Beomgyu found himself unable to look away, like his own line of sight was drawn by magnetism. “If I say I am, what will you do? Will you kill me? Or turn me over to the Admiral so he’ll have to do it?”

“I’ll take it to my grave. No one else will ever know.” Yeonjun said, his gaze turning almost tender. “But I have to.”

Beomgyu’s breath caught in his throat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand we're back after a couple months of um... u know... 𝓹𝓪𝓷𝓭𝓮𝓶𝓲𝓬 𝓽𝓲𝓷𝓰𝔃™
> 
> Thanks to everyone who waited most patiently for the return of the universe's most useless lieutenants! ❤ Ok I'm kidding I think I just need to say that they do have some successful missions but I obviously don't give enough shits to write those in detail. I love failure!
> 
> See you again on the next new moon for the next chapter! Looking forward 2 seeing your theories & reactions in the comments 👀
> 
> ♥ Rice


	31. Icy

The wind whips at Chaeryeong’s thick down jacket, making her wish she could’ve worn her exosuit instead. She balls her hands into fists, or as much as she can in her stiff gloves, as she marches up the gentle slope after the others, ice crunching under her feet.

 _Think of it as an extension of your holiday,_ Major Jung had said at the briefing. Chaeryeong had never had any violent thoughts against the major until that point.

“Everyone okay?” Yeji’s voice comes over the communication decides tucked into their ears. Her voice is almost a little whisper against the howling of the wind around them.

“I can’t feel my limbs but yeah, I’m good!” Yuna barks back.

“You’re almost to the resort entrance.” Lia’s voice says, accompanied by nothing but the dull hum of the ship around her. “It should be coming up just now.”

Chaeryeong wishes she could’ve come up with a reason to stay behind on the ship, too. _It must be so warm there._

Soobin turns and extends a hand to Chaeryeong.

Chaeryeong shakes her head as if to say, _No, I’m fine._

“Is that it?” Yuna yells, jogging up to the top of the dune of ice giddily. “Oh wow! It’s tacky as hell!”

Chaeryeong groans, holding her knees as she stomps the last few steps to the top of the hill. The wind picks up then – not that it had ever faltered – blowing the light snow and mist away to reveal three high peaks reaching up to the hazy bluish starlight above. Little dots streak down the sloped sides of the mountains, ending up somewhere behind the large mirrored building wrapped around the base of the three mountains. Projected in a massive hologram above the mirrored building are the words: _Winter Wonderland Ski Resort._

Chaeryeong is glad for the relatively flat walk up to the building, whose outer walls, upon closer inspection, seem to be made of smooth ice and not mirrors. Yeji gives Chaeryeong a pointed look, before she and Yuna disappear into the throng of tourists.

A robot made of three stacked white spheres rolls over to greet them. “Welcome to the Winter Wonderland, ma’ams and sirs.”

Chaeryeong tries to smile at the robot, but her eyes are drawn to its weird, conical nose and just how _orange_ said nose is. _What’s it supposed to be?_

“Please pay the visitor fees at the turnstile,” The robot says, as two sections of the ice wall ahead of them separate to reveal a row of turnstiles. They remind Chaeryeong of the toll booths back in her dome, only these turnstiles are made of a clear, bluish ice rather than steel. “Please be advised that rates have increased by 50% as of this solar cycle. Have a wonderful wintry day!”

Chaeryeong wiggles the circulation back into her frozen fingers when she reaches the turnstile. They still fumble around like nothing more than a bundle of sausages as she rummages for her fob.

“Gosh, we’re going to be here all day,” Someone half-laughs, half-grumbles from behind her, tapping their fob twice against the terminal. “There you go, beautiful.”

At first Chaeryeong thinks it must be Soobin playing around, but it’s not Soobin’s voice.

Chaeryeong’s too surprised to turn around right away, but when she does, it’s too late. The tall stranger had already passed through the turnstile, the back of their dull gray coat vanishing into the crowds of people milling about the resort’s lounge.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“We we’re looking for _one_ guy in a whole _planet_ of people?” Yuna asked, her already large eyes bugging out wider.

“No. Not exactly.” Major Jung sighed. “One of our main informants, he goes by the name White Rabbit, has been captured by the radicals, and his last known location, according to his tracker, is this planet. Luckily, the only structure on that planet is a ski resort.”

“So we have to bring him back?” Yeji asked.

“Or confirm that he’s dead.”

Chaeryeong took a deep breath.

The entire meeting room fell silent until Ryujin cut into the silence with a scoff.

“I take back what I said about _our_ mission, it’s easy peesy compared to yours.” Ryujin said.

Yeji shot her a sharp look.

“Can’t you confirm by long-range scans whether he’s dead or alive?” Lia asked, shifting in her seat.

“There’s no need. His tracker would’ve sent a report to the Information Board if he had died.” Soobin said. There was a weird undercurrent to the way he said that. Chaeryeong didn’t want to know how he knew that.

“Yes, it should.” Taehyun nodded eagerly. “I can call in a favor with one of my former colleagues-”

“White Rabbit doesn’t have a State tracker.” Major Jung said. “They’ve had it removed and replaced with… another.”

Chaeryeong glanced across the table at the scar running down Ryujin’s forearm. Ryujin noticed more than two pairs of eyes looking her way, so she quickly unrolled her sweater sleeves down to her wrists.

“So they’re undercover as a radical?” Yeji asked, turning to the major.

Major Jung sighed. “Yes. How else would they get ahold of the intel?”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

“The doors are now closing. The doors are now closing.”

“Hurry,” Soobin says, ushering Chaeryeong into the lift car, which, according to the holo-projection in the windows, is taking them to the lowest of the three peaks. She knows it must be the lowest peak for sure, because she’s surrounded by bouncing children and their disgruntled parents.

Chaeryeong notices one of the kids looking up with a strange expression. She follows his line of sight up to Soobin, whose curled hair is tinted a lighter, tawny color, and brushed down almost to his thick-framed glasses.

She looks back down at the child, who’s still gaping up at Soobin. _No way this kid’s recognized him._

“Honey,” Chaeryeong says, looping her arm in Soobin’s, turning him to the window and out of the kid’s line of sight. The idea of Beomgyu’s sour expression, if he’d been here, makes her smile. “Unnie and the kids are waiting at the top, aren’t they?”

“I hope so,” Soobin says, patting Chaeryeong’s hand very lightly. He breaks into a grin. “Or we went all the way up here for nothing.”

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

“These should deal with the facial recognition shit,” Yuna said, handing out pairs of glasses to Chaeryeong, Yeji, and Soobin. Chaeryeong and Yeji tried theirs on, blinking to adjust to them, but Soobin only held his frames up.

“Seriously?” Soobin asked, the corner of his mouth turning up in amusement as he wagged the pair of thick, unwieldy tortoiseshell glasses that Yuna had given him.

“The frames are just for the facial recognition software, but they don’t do much for plain old nosy people,” Yuna explained, taking the glasses out of his hands and jamming them unceremoniously onto his face. “You need all the help you can get, General Junior. The entire universe sees your face every Holiday Address.”

Soobin pursed his lips, adjusting the heavy frames on his small nose. “Fair enough.”

“Doesn’t seem like it’s enough, though.” Lia stood back, cocking her head to one side as she looked Soobin over. She flashed a grin at the others. “I think he’ll look cute with a perm, what do you guys think?”

“We’ve got to lighten his hair, too,” Yeji suggested.

Yuna snickered. “He’s going to look like a dog.”

“Maybe a perm would be too much.” Chaeryeong said slowly, but she turned to find Lia and Yeji already holding all the equipment they needed.

Soobin sighed. “I really don’t think that many people know or care what the General’s kids look like. Besides, they don’t really show us on TV anym-”

“Oh no, this is _completely_ _necessary_.” Lia shook her head, grinning. “Isn’t it, Captain?”

Yeji, with her arms full of bottles of temporary hair color, nodded solemnly. “Of course. Begin makeover protocol, Ms. Choi.”

Soobin looked to Chaeryeong for help, but she only laughed at him.

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Chaeryeong’s hand, which was freezing just a few minutes ago, is starting to get sweaty as the lift reached the building perched at the top of the slope. She nudges Soobin lightly. “Um.”

“Sorry.” Soobin lets go of her hand as they exit the lift, tucking his hands into his coat. He stands aside as several young families pass carrying sled pods from the rental shop at the far end of the building perched at the top of the slope. “Darling, could you call your sister, please?”

 _“Darling”. I am_ so _telling Beomgyu about that._ Chaeryeong holds a snort back while she pulls up their private comms line on her watch. “Hello, Unnie? Yeah, we’re here, but we can’t seem to see you, where are you guys?”

“Oh, hey, great you guys are there already.” Lia’s voice comes into the earpiece tucked away under Chaeryeong’s mufflers. “I’m gonna need you to find the maintenance room so I can get into their surveillance system. This goddamn place doesn’t have an updated floorplan registered with the Safety Board for some reason-”

“So what are we looking for?” Soobin mumbles into the comms, turned to face the information holo-screen of the building lobby.

“It’s probably as far as possible out of the tourists’ way, so I’d be looking for a basement or unlabeled door or something like that.”

“Thanks, Unnie, I’ll call you back if I still can’t find you,” Chaeryeong says, pretending to hang up on her watch. She loops her arm around Soobin’s.

“The map doesn’t seem to say anything helpful, so let’s go this way,” Soobin says, pointing down a side corridor leading off the main entrance. They follow the corridor until it comes to an abrupt stop at the toilets.

“Maybe we should split up,” Chaeryeong says.

“It’ll look more unusual. See you back here in two minutes.” Soobin says, casting a quick glance at the surveillance camera in the corner of the ceiling before ducking into the men’s toilets.

Chaeryeong nods and steps into the women’s toilets. She weaves in and around the mothers holding their children’s hands as they wait in line for the cubicles to free up. Her own hands go back to feeling cold and empty. She stays there for a little while, only until the sinking feeling in her chest grows too strong to ignore. _Two minutes must be up._

She steps out of the restroom, noticing Soobin immediately where he waits for her in the lobby. More than a couple of the tired moms glance not-so-surreptitiously his way as they pass Chaeryeong, who sighs. _There’s no way to make him inconspicuous, is there?_

Chaeryeong’s nearly rescued him when something knocks into her. She looks down to find a small girl clinging to her knees.

“I’m so sorry, dear, please look where you’re going,” Chaeryeong says, trying to gently guide the girl away from her, but the girl only clings harder.

“Subin, don’t bother the lady,” A woman in the far end of the sinks calls over, drying her hands as quickly as she can before stomping over. She gives Chaeryeong an apologetic smile as she pries her daughter off Chaeryeong’s knees. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s fine, really,” Chaeryeong assures the girl’s mom, patting the girl on the head. “Don’t worry about it, Subin.”

The girl shrugs. “Okay.”

“We’ll be going now, so sorry again,” The girl’s mom reddens in embarrassment before pulling her daughter away, towards the exit to the slopes.

Chaeryeong jumps in surprise when someone takes her arm. She looks up. “Oh, it’s just you.”

“Who else would it be?” Soobin grins, leading Chaeryeong down another corridor on the opposite end of the lobby.

He seems to be looking her way a lot, so Chaeryeong frowns at him. “What is it?”

“Maybe I should’ve paired up with Yeji instead.” Soobin says, casually trying an unmarked door as they pass it. It opens to reveal a rack of mops and floor cleaner.

“Why?”

“You get distracted by kids.” Soobin grins at her, closing the door gently. He nods to the noise from the lobby echoing down the corridor. “And there are too many of them here.”

“I don’t get _distracted_.” Chaeryeong says. “I just like kids. Don’t you?”

Soobin says nothing as he tries another door while Chaeryeong keeps watch for any unwelcome resort staff roaming around.

“I try not to.” Soobin says, peering behind the door before quickly closing it. He smiles at Chaeryeong when he notices the latter frowning at him. “Just another utility closet.”

Chaeryeong purses her lips. “Why?”

“It’s full of trash cans and stuff.”

“No, Soobin, why don’t you want to like kids-”

“It’s a waste of time wanting something you can’t have, Chaeryeong.” Soobin says, trying the last door in the hallway. It opens to nothing but darkness, until the swinging of the door seems to trigger a bare strip light to come to life overhead, illuminating a winding set of steps down into more darkness. Soobin smiles at Chaeryeong. “Will you go first or will I?”

Chaeryeong frowns. “Soobin…”

Soobin’s already started down the steps, his shoulders tensing slightly when the strip lights only come to life once he passes under them.

Chaeryeong considers for a moment before letting the door close behind them. She follows after Soobin, who’s already gone around the bend. Chaeryeong holds her breath, lifting her feet to keep her footsteps down, though if anyone’s down there, they’ll see the lights go on when Soobin and Chaeryeong reach the bottom of the stairs.

Chaeryeong reaches out and lays a hand on Soobin’s shoulder.

He turns his face to give her a quarter of a smile.

They carry on in a sympathetic silence, tiptoeing down the steps lit only by the lights directly above them.

Soobin extends a hand to hold Chaeryeong behind when he reaches the bottom of the stairs. He went around the last bend first, but Chaeryeong didn’t stall behind him for very long. She tiptoed after him, entering the small, concrete room lined with holo-screens on three of four of the walls.

Chaeryeong took a relieved gasp of the stale air in the room when she realized it was empty.

“Lia, we found the maintenance room.” Soobin said, tapping his watch. “What do we need to-”

“Hold on, Yuna’s yelling at me- No, Yuna, I did _not_ set that off, whatever it is!”

Soobin and Chaeryeong exchange frowns.

Soobin clears his throat. “Lia, can you please link our comms to-’

“You’re a motherfucking lieutenant, Yuna, you shouldn’t be afraid of a fire alarm! And the building’s made of fucking ice, how could it- _WHAT_?”

Chaeryeong taps her watch. “Lia, what’s going-”

“Yeji is _what?_ ” Lia chokes over the comms.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Yeji rammed the heel of her boot into the man’s chest, knocking him to the ground. She fired her stun gun at a second man behind her, who’d raised what looked like a monkey wrench over her head.

The wrench clattered to the floor, leaving cracks in the roughened ice floor.

“I’m gonna need some backup.” Yeji said, bending over the men to brush their long hair off the space behind their ears. Sure enough, they both had the raised bump with that tattoo of an encircled cross on it. “Yuna, where are you?”

“On the way! Don’t do anything stupid!”

Yeji looked around the deserted gift shop. The wail of sirens continued to echo throughout the building, which looked more like candy than ice, bathed in the bright red emergency lights overhead.

She crouched low, letting the shelves loaded with souvenirs provide cover as she made her way towards the gift shop’s exit.

The ice walls and floor of the corridor outside seemed shinier than they ought to be, reflecting too much of the bright red lights above.

Yeji reached out and touches the nearest wall. Her gloved hand slid down. The wall was slick with water.

“Yuna, I think the building’s-” Yeji never got to finish her sentence, because she ducked behind the shelf, holding her breath to keep fog from streaming out of her mouth and giving her away.

“The fuck happened here?” A woman’s voice carried from the far end of the gift shop.

Someone snickered from slightly closer to Yeji’s shelf. “You think Bottleneck and Duckbill knocked each other out thinking-”

“Shut up.” The woman said. “Did you hear that?”

Yeji didn’t dare swallow, her fingers curling around her stun gun’s trigger. _I’ll only be able to get one of them, though._

“It’s nothing.” The man said, his voice worryingly close to where Yeji was squatting.

A figure stepped into the corner of Yeji’s sight, and she raised her stun gun to fire at them, but they knocked it out of her hand and somehow fired it directly at her even before she could even realize what was going on.

She knew the feeling of being on the receiving end of the stun gun – every Academy cadet goes through that on their second year, regardless of major. There was one exam Yeji would never forget, where the examiners shot at the cadets, who then had to figure out which setting the stun gun was set at.

Yeji aced that exam, of course. She knew, even after all these years, that the man had shot her at the median setting, which would knock someone with her physique out for around 45 minutes at best.

_It makes no sense. I had it set at maximum._

She hadn’t seen someone disarm someone and change the level on the stun gun that quickly, not since her days at the Academy.

Yeji concentrated, calming herself down to slow the stun further as it traveled through her body. She was only able to stay awake long enough to catch an apologetic look from a man she didn’t recognize, as he crouched over her, his dusty gray coat trailing on the damp floor.

Everything faded to darkness.

“Did you kill her?” The woman’s voice seemed to reach Yeji’s ears as if through water.

“Of course.” The man said.

“You’re sure?”

“Who’s the doctor between us, huh, Parrot? Of course I’m sure.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Chaeryeong and Soobin stand at the edge of the balcony, along with dozens of tourists, watching in horror as the building below them is enveloped in a massive cloud of white steam.

“How can a building made of ice catch _fire_?” Soobin asks.

“I don’t know, but if anyone can do it, _they_ can.” Chaeryeong says, giving Soobin a pointed look. He nods.

She looks her left, at the lift dock, where resort staff are trying to hold off the tourists pressing towards the lift. “The lifts aren’t working.”

“Probably emergency shutdown.” Soobin says. “We’d better get down there and neutralize the… But how?”

Chaeryeong looks at the opposite end of the building, where the rental shop has been abandoned by the staff, who have joined the others in trying to calm the panicked tourists down.

“The fastest way,” Chaeryeong says, taking Soobin by the arm. She drags him against the current of families rushing towards the exit.

She nicks a rental card for a family-sized sled pod, ignoring the alarm that begins blaring in the shop. It’s quickly drowned out by the shouts from the crowds of tourists rushing towards the exit. She breaks into a run for the opening to the slope, hearing Soobin’s boots hit the snow behind her.

Chaeryeong reads the card. “G04, we’re looking for-”

“There it is!” Soobin says, narrowly dodging a group of people running back into the building upon seeing the massive cloud of steam, now streaked with darker gray smoke, below. He reaches the sled pod first, only stepping aside to let Chaeryeong unlock it with the card.

The pod is only small enough to fit Chaeryeong and Soobin sitting down, with just enough space in a third seat for a small child.

“Do you know how to operate this thing?” Chaeryeong asks, fumbling with the straps around her seat.

“No, the ski resort we went to when I was a kid was, uh… different.”

 _Of course it was._ Chaeryeong sighs, reaching over to help Soobin put his seatbelt on.

She reaches up and shuts the pod, waiting for a reassuring click from the latch before hitting the large green launch button at the front of the pod.

The sled pod jerks forward in place, but something seems to hold it back.

“It might need someone back in the building to uh, release the pod-”

“Fuck that.” Chaeryeong unclips her seatbelt and reopens the clear roof of the pod, jumping out. She walks around the back, scuffing up the snow around the pod until she finds the culprit. The pod is stuck to a strip of metal nearly buried beneath the snow. “It’s got some kind of magnetic dock…”

“I think I’ve got something for that.” Soobin says, reaching into his coat for something.

“What?”

Soobin pulls out a small black box, only as tall and wide as his thumb.

“What’s that?”

“Something from Beomgyu,” Soobin says, a light flush coloring his already pink cheeks and nose. “It’ll turn the entire magnetic strip off, though, so all the pods might fall.”

Chaeryeong looks at the nine sled pods in the same row as theirs. “They’re all empty-”

“They might crash into ours.”

“We just have to get down there.” Chaeryeong insists. “How do you activate that thing?”

“I can set it on a timer.” Soobin says, fiddling with the tiny box.

“Okay, give it ten seconds,” Chaeryeong says. “Or fifteen, so you can get your seatbelt on.”

Soobin’s face reddens as he lowers the cube onto the metal strip. “Okay. Fifteen seconds it is.”

Lia chews on her bottom lip, eyes darting between the three large holo-screens projected on the ship’s dash ahead of her, with Yuna speaking into the earbud in her left ear and Soobin and Chaeryeong talking into the other. It’s times like these that she wonders whether evolution was a big old joke, because people haven’t evolved the ability to actually multitask.

“I just passed the Premium Massage Lounge,” Yuna yaps into Lia’s ear.

“Wait, I don’t think there’s a massage lounge in my map-”

“ _Premium_ Massage Lounge!”

“There isn’t _any_ massage lounge!” Lia whines. With her left hand, she pans through the last floorplan the resort had submitted to the Information Board, which is projected onto the left-hand screen. The building seems much simpler than whatever Yuna’s making her way through, and much smaller. _I am suing this goddamned resort the_ second _we finish the mission._

“Lia we need immediate-” Soobin’s cut off by a loud screeching noise, like a blast of static right in Lia’s ear.

Lia yanks the earbuds out of both her ears, wincing in pain as she switches them to loudspeaker. “Sorry, I didn’t get that, what did you say?”

“Please-”

Another loud noise cuts Soobin off, which, on the bridge’s speakers, sounds almost like the clash of cymbals to Lia.

“What’s going on over there?” She asks, turning to the right-hand screen.

The right-hand screen lists all the five lieutenants’ approximate locations and vitals, according to their arm trackers. Most of the lieutenants’ stats are highlighted in white, except for Yeji’s which has gone gray. _UNREACHABLE_ , a marker in the corner of Yeji’s report reads. Lia’s right hand is desperately trying to manually contact Yeji’s tracker again, but without a floorplan of the resort, she’s playing around with absolute coordinates and a rough 3D render of the entire planet from the ship’s scanners.

Soobin’s and Chaeryeong’s vitals start blinking green, snapping her concentration like a rubber band.

Lia almost rolls her eyes at the alert message, telling her that Soobin and Chaeryeong’s heart rates have spiked. _Uh,_ duh _, of course. I’d be scared if their heart rates were normal._ Her own heart is hammering away in her chest as she flits frantically between the screens.

A new notification bubble appears in the corner of her screen.

 _Forty cruisers dispatched from Fleet Outpost FPO-777 have arrived,_ the notification reads.

Lia’s about to look around when a wave of small ships (larger than her own, though) fly overhead, casting fleeting shadows over the _Cadenza_ and all the other ships in the resort’s parking lot.

“Yuna, the rangers are here... Yuna?”

“You okay?”

“Nnnngh.”

Soobin can only afford to cast one glance at Chaeryeong, who has her hands and feet braced on every surface of the pod she can find. Her usually pale face has taken on a weird, sickly greenish color.

Soobin turns back to the view from their sled pod’s windshield, which is changing every second. Their sled pod had started down the slope upright, as it was meant to. A couple bumps from the other sled pods had sent it a little off course, which Soobin quickly corrected with the tiller at the back of the pod.

Then a nearby pod smashed into something dark that looked worryingly like a large, jagged rock, cracking the pod open like an egg. Soobin had tried to steer their pod out of the way, but the broken pod had caused a group of them to clump together, ramming Soobin and Chaeryeong’s pod with the weight of a small ship. The pod had released an emergency drag chute, as sign that the management had had _some_ idea of basic safety, but the drag chute had caught on the edge of another pod’s broken windshield and been shredded to pieces. That had been a few seconds ago, and now their pod is careening to the edge of the designated sledding area.

Soobin had seen the area’s safety guards from the lift, high orange walls made of net running down the sides of the designated sledding area – outside of the walls, the frozen slopes were jagged and uneven, with pitch-black cliffs of the underlying rock peeking through.

But he couldn’t see the orange net now. _Did it go down with the emergency shutdown?_

_WHY THE HELL WOULD THEY DO THAT?_

“Lia, please reply when you’ve got our location.” Soobin says, the panic rising in his throat.

Soobin grabs the tiller, but the handle moves too easily in his hand, and the mechanism lets out a dry gasp where it would normally groan with some resistance against the snow. _Something must’ve happened to the rudder._

_Shit._

“Lia, please confirm pickup now!”

Something hits the windshield with a sickening crunch, as a lightning streak of cracks spread from one corner of the glass.

_We might not even make it off the edge._

“Lia, do you have our location?” Soobin asks into his comms, but all he’s getting is a buzz in is ears that’s almost inaudible under the crunch of ice and snow around their pod. “Hello? Lia? Please initiate pickup protocol!”

Chaeryeong’s eyes are screwed shut. “Soobin I think I’m gonna throw up.”

Soobin, despite the chill cutting in through the badly insulated pod, is sweating rivers. “Lia, initiate pickup _NOW_ -”

Something hits the pod again, sending another crack snaking up the opposite end of the pod’s windshield.

“Oh god,” Chaeryeong says, the sound of her stomach heaving filling the tiny sled pod. “Oh god-”

Soobin reaches, grabbing onto Chaeryeong’s arm in what he hopes is still a reassuring manner despite how hard he has to hold on. “Don’t worry-”

The sickening scraping of the pod against the slope stops abruptly. The entire pod lifts into the air, jerking Soobin and Chaeryeong forward against their seatbelts. Soobin braces himself for the impact, sure to finally crack their windshield wide open, but it never comes.

“Fuck.” Chaeryeong says, one hand in front of her mouth. Her hair is dangling straight up from her head – or rather, straight _down_.

Soobin frowns out of the pod’s windshield, but with the pod suspended upside down in a tow field like this, all he can see is the slope below, almost pure white but peppered with dark, jagged rocks. _And this slope is supposed to be for_ children _? What is_ wrong _with this place?_

“Hey Lia, thanks for the save, but could you turn us right-side-up, please?” Soobin asks over the comms.

Chaeryeong’s taking shallow breaths. “Lia, please flip us over for the love of-”

“Guys? Oh my god, you’re back!”

“Lia,” Soobin sighs with relief. “Yeah, could you please flip us over, we’re upside-down right-”

“Hold on, where are you guys? You stopped moving?” Lia sounds confused, but she couldn’t be nearly as confused as Chaeryeong and Soobin as they exchange looks, both of their faces read from hanging upside-down for so long.

Chaeryeong clears her throat, an unpleasant experience when you’re wrong-side-up. “You mean you’re _not_ the one who’s got us in a tow field?”

“What tow field?”

“Lia? Lia? Oh, fuck this,” Yuna mutters as she wades through the water, stun gun in one hand while she shields her head from the falling debris with the other. The curved arches of the resort’s ice building are beginning to collapse, falling into the worryingly warm water below before melting away to nothing.

The figure some twenty meters ahead of her pushes on, splashing agitatedly through the now waist-deep water, but they’re slowed down by a second person they’re dragging through the water. Yuna had been planning to ignore them they first passed her, assuming they were tourists trying to escape the melting building, but the second person’s wearing the same pea-green winter jacket as Yeji, down to the fur-trimmed hood.

Yuna jumps up onto a flat structure that might’ve been a bar once, judging by the bottles of liquor floating aimlessly around it. She slides across the bar’s surface, quickly overtaking the figure and firing a single shot of her stun gun in one go.

The figure crumples to the ground, dropping the second person into the water.

She hops off the bar, never once taking her finger over the trigger of her stun gun as she approaches them.

Yuna turns the figure in the pea-green jacket over. Their hood’s fallen down, revealing that Yuna’s been an idiot all this time. It’s not Yeji at all, but a very thin man, whose face is swollen and covered in purplish-black welts.

Yuna doesn’t have more time to study him, because the other person rises to their feet. It’s a woman almost a head taller than Yuna, and twice as broad. Yuna fires another round from her stun gun, but it seems to only surprise the other woman as it ripples along the surface of her coat, before dissipating to nothing.

 _Goddamn it._ Yuna ducks out of the way at the woman lunges at her.

She picks up one of the liquor bottles that had been floating around, taking a swing at the other woman, but she also seemed to have the same idea, because Yuna’s bottle smashes aimlessly into another in the other woman’s hand.

Yuna shields her eyes, staggering backward in the water, which seems deeper than before.

The other woman stumbles, weighed down by her dense felt coat, soaking up the slightly warm water like a dish sponge.

Yuna picks up another bottle, this one of her second favorite brand of whisky, swinging it at the other woman.

The other woman doesn’t seem hurt despite Yuna’s best efforts, but she _does_ lose her footing, slipping into the water until her head’s gone under the surface.

Yuna starts getting away, half swimming and half running to the exit.

“D- Don’t let her get away!” The man in the green jacket chokes out, clutching his shoulder in pain. “She’s one of the Admiral’s!”

Yuna hesitates by the exit. _How the hell does he-_

Then she realizes. The bumps and welts on his face must be obscuring the sneering, protruding features of the man they’d been sent here to look for. _It’s White Rabbit._

_Just my luck._

“Kill her!” The informant – _well, former informant –_ gasps out. “You have to kill her!”

A large weight falls onto Yuna from behind, pushing her down below the surface.

“There _must_ be a ship, Lia,” Chaeryeong insists, trying to take breaths to steady her stomach against gravity. She closes her eyes, not daring to watch the ground fly over their heads. “We’re caught in _someone_ ’s tow field!”

“Wait, I’ll go to you guys, I’ve got your location, autopilot’s starting up-”

“Before you do that, send a drone to identify this ship.” Soobin says. “Check their registration.”

“What? You mean you think-”

“Just do it.” Soobin snaps, before returning his usual, softer tone to add, “Please.”

“Yes, sir.” Lia says, probably on instinct.

Chaeryeong looks at Soobin out of the corner of her eye. Of all the things that are causing her discomfort right now, nothing is making her more uncomfortable than that flash of _something_ she saw in Soobin’s usually docile eyes.

They hang there in silence, Chaeryeong hearing nothing but the gentle hum of pod’s surface as it hangs in the tow field, and the hammering of her heartbeat in her ears.

Lia cuts into the silence. “They’re not registered with the Transportation Board.”

Chaeryeong tries to swallow, but it gets caught somewhere in her throat. “So that means…”

“Don’t come for us, Lia,” Soobin says. “They might have artillery-”

“But-” Lia begins to protest.

“Why would radicals care enough to rescue one of a whole bunch of pods falling down the slope by accident?” Chaeryeong asks, turning to Soobin with a frown. “And even if they did know it was us, they don’t know who we are-”

“Maybe they do.”

Chaeryeong’s mouth goes dry. “Soobin-”

“Yuna’s out cold too, now!” Lia says before Chaeryeong can finish whatever it was she had been planning to say. “I’m taking the ship to-”

“Lia, don’t.” Soobin says.

Chaeryeong’s never heard him talk like that, never anything clearer than his usual polite, sheepish mumble.

“But Yuna-”

“Set the ship on course to the rendezvous.” Soobin says. “Go now, Lia.”

Chaeryeong’s hands go numb with fear. “Soobin-”

“I’m not just going to leave you guys!”

“It’s not a suggestion, Lia, it’s protocol.” Soobin's hands curl into fists. “The radicals already have the rest of us. Get back to the rendezvous so we have at least _one_ lieutentant to report-”

The tow field drops the pod before he can finish his sentence.

• • • ○ ◑ ◗ ● • • •

Soobin could only watch as the rest of the crew’s vitals blinked to black, like nothing more than lights being switched off on a Moon morning.

Only two of the ten remained, his own stats highlighted a stark white next to the captain’s deep red.

 _Excessive blood loss,_ the tracking system reported. _Assessment: Possibly wounded._

“C- Captain,” Soobin stammered out. He was losing all feeling in his legs, thankful for the seat beneath him. He was only seeing their vitals, impersonal numbers on a screen. He couldn’t imagine what it looked like down there, out of the ship and on the ground. “Captain-”

“Soobin, set course for the rendezvous now.” The captain’s breathing was labored, each breath marked by the ragged, wet sounds of blood invading her airways. “Send my apologies to the Admiral.”

Soobin’s eyes seared. “Captain, I can’t leave you-”

“I’ve opened all the gas channels in the base. I’ve set it to ignite in 2 minutes. I won’t let a single one of them off this planet.”

“But Captain- The others-” Soobin gasped out between sobs. “We have to bring them home- We have to bring all of you-”

The captain let out a wheezing noise, something like a sigh. “I told the Admiral you weren’t ready for the field.”

Soobin would later remember that his father had said something similar, before forcibly assigning him to the Archives. But at this moment he could only hang one trembling hand over the button, the one, simple button that would start the ship on a course to one of the ARTF’s agreed rendezvous points.

“You’re too young. I’m not.” The captain had chuckled then, before groaning in pain. Soobin could hear sirens wailing behind her, probably from something that she set off in the radical base. “Besides, don’t you have someone waiting for you back home?”

Soobin imagined Beomgyu then, frowning deeply while he worked on some prototype in the lab, thinking Soobin was just sitting in an office a few floors away.

“Yes, I do.”

“I don’t. There’s no one left.” The captain coughed, as Soobin watched her vitals drop away. “It’s been an honor working with you, Lieutenant Kim. Goodbye.”

• • • ● ◖ ◐ ○ • • •

Lia stares at the rightmost screen.

She _had_ opened the rendezvous chart when Soobin had asked her to, but she hadn’t done anything else since then, since he hadn’t ordered her to do anything else since then. _Because you lost contact with them, dummy._

_You lost contact with all of them._

Lia chews on her lip. Now it wasn’t just Yeji’s tracker, but all four of the others’, all of them were listed as _Unreachable_ , a status she had never even heard of. Her vitals were the only ones highlighted white in a sea of gray.

It was something so basic that she’s known it since elementary school: There was no way to shut a State Tracker off. You could remove it from your arm, which was always trendy among teenagers, but even then, it would still send reports, alerting the local authorities of your crime.

One of the engineers in the gigaship she had worked in, the _Cantabile,_ had died from a heart attack one day, and even then, his tracker continued to send reports that he’d passed away. And of course, she’d stayed up watching those reports of corpses found abandoned in far-flung star systems, because of their State trackers, still dutifully sending out reports though their owners had been long dead. Nothing, not fire, not even a nuclear blast, nothing could destroy a State tracker.

 _So what happened to them?_ Lia wonders, looking at the for gray boxes next to her friends’ faces.

Lia slumps over, burying her face between her knees. _Soobin’s probably right, I should go back to the rendezvous point. The radicals probably got to them. They’re probably all-_

Lia rubs her face in exasperation, biting on her tongue to hold the tears back. _That’s just the problem, isn’t it? They_ are _my friends, even if one of them is the fucking spy who probably set us up in the first place._

She sits up again, looking at the button to launch the ship towards the rendezvous point.

It requires no effort on her part, she knows, she’d just have to sit there while the ship brought her to some abandoned rest station or something, for Major Jung to meet her.

“Screw it!” Lia says, sliding the button off her screen. She sets the _Cadenza_ ’s security settings to maximum before shutting the ship down.

“Fuck it!” Lia shouts at no one in particular, her voice echoing off the dim walls of the ship’s interior as the lavender strips of light on the floor take over. She grabs a stun gun, stuffing it into an inside pocket of her thick winter coat before stepping out of the _Cadenza_ and into a foggy gray evening, made worse by clouds upon clouds of thick steam from the molten building up ahead of her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 🌑 See you guys on March 13 for the next chapter! 🌑
> 
> I've not got a lot of work this week, so I'll try replying to comments, so ask away! 💕
> 
> ❤ Rice (02/11/21)


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